Ian Cormac is a man, but years of being gridlinked into the AI net have taken away much of his humanity. Usually thats a plus when dealing with the scum of the universe, as he does as an Earth Central Security Agent, but in this case, his lack of human response destroys his cover, and the thieves hes worked so hard to get in with think hes an android plant. When Angelina Pelter, their leaders sister, tries to kill him and gets killed instead, her brother goes mad, determined to get revenge.
But Ian doesnt know this quite yet. On Samarkand, a way station planet at the edge of the universe, someone has transported in via runcibles, AI devices that can teleport a person anywhere in seconds. Unfortunately, hes transported in just below the speed of light, and the result is a near total devastation of that world...those left alive will soon freeze to death, save two dracomen. Cormacs job is to find out who sabotaged the runcible, not knowing that Arian Pelter is hot on his trail.
This high science thriller is really well done. The tech is interesting and well realized, the runcibles and the AI net in particular giving the piece a lot of flavor. There are a lot of neat weapons, and every new technological aspect is well explained. My favorite bit was the golem (a type of android developed specifically for battle) that Arian connects himself to. Psychotic is too light a word for Mr. Crane, and he adds a lot to the more chilling aspects of the book as he attacks any job assigned to him with murderous relish. Theres also the idea that people can be modified to fulfill certain tasks that I found intriguing. For example, making it so that people can work in heavy grav conditions seems to be something that would be extremely useful. Modifications and machines come together in Dragon, part creature, part machine, he seems to enjoy helping Arian on his mission...but who knows what his real agenda is? Hes really strange...huge, hes made up of four spheres of flesh, each a kilometer (to stick with the books terminology) large. Its he whos created and unleashed the dracomen. He seems to be trying to put himself in a puppet master type role, causing trouble behind the scenes to make way for larger, more troubling goals. Whatever it is, its something the Dragons been working on ever since the last time he ran into Cormac, twenty some years earlier.
Ian is a complicated and interesting character. Because of his lack of humanity, hes been banned from being gridlinked, and now, instead of knowing things automatically, he has to find them out the old fashioned way...through research and gumshoe work, which I thought was really fascinating. He can't even travel via runcible anymore, which slows him down considerably. The fact that he has to solve these puzzles without the abilities he took for granted for so long adds a lot to the excitement of this book, while his struggles to relearn what it means to be human and to deal with his fellow beings gives it its heart.
A dark techno thriller with teeth, Gridlinked was first published in the UK a year or so ago. Its been getting a lot of praise, all of it well deserved.
Gridlinked
Neal Asher
