March 3, 2018
Robopocalypse takes a common-enough idea: robots take over the world, and turns it into some new, fresh and exciting. Our narrator Cormac "Bright Boy" Wallace starts at the end of the war, when humanity has just barely managed to put down the evil AI (no spoilers; we know the outcome of the war from page one) and then backs up to tell us how it all happened, sharing personal recollections and recordings kept in a "black box" by Archos, the AI who started the war.
The format is a bit like World War Z in that respect, but author Daniel Wilson brings a special skill set to bear, as he has advanced degrees in robotics and artificial intelligence. His application of that knowledge comes across as terrifying and believable, yet never too academic. Also, as a Cherokee citizen, Wilson offers wonderfully fresh points of view that add personality and moxie to this dystopian tale. Setting the redoubt of human resistance in the Osage Nation makes perfect sense, (especially after reading about the resilience of the Osage in Killers of the Flower Moon). The resistance could never have succeeded with an Indigenous system of knowledge and perspective. In the early days of the war, the Osage survivors literally dance to life a new hope for human society.
Even though there are many characters, presented as quick portrait sketches from all over the world, we learn to care about each of them -- Cormac the reluctant warrior; Takeo the elderly Japanese tech savant; Mathilda Perez, the ten-year-old girl with special powers; Nine Oh Two, a sentient free robot; and even Lurker, an obnoxious teenager techno-prankster who turns out to have a heroic side. They all make valuable contributions, and show humanity in a high-tech, inhuman war.
I especially appreciated Wilson's depiction of Archos the enemy AI, who is scary powerful but not omnipotent. His strengths and weaknesses are believable. His motives make sense. We feel empathy for him, as we must for any really good villain. Wilson does a great job showing all sides of the battle, and he definitely keeps the pages turning!
(Thanks to Rebecca Roanhorse for recommending this book in her excellent article "Postcards from the Apocalypse" https://uncannymagazine.com/article/p....)
The format is a bit like World War Z in that respect, but author Daniel Wilson brings a special skill set to bear, as he has advanced degrees in robotics and artificial intelligence. His application of that knowledge comes across as terrifying and believable, yet never too academic. Also, as a Cherokee citizen, Wilson offers wonderfully fresh points of view that add personality and moxie to this dystopian tale. Setting the redoubt of human resistance in the Osage Nation makes perfect sense, (especially after reading about the resilience of the Osage in Killers of the Flower Moon). The resistance could never have succeeded with an Indigenous system of knowledge and perspective. In the early days of the war, the Osage survivors literally dance to life a new hope for human society.
Even though there are many characters, presented as quick portrait sketches from all over the world, we learn to care about each of them -- Cormac the reluctant warrior; Takeo the elderly Japanese tech savant; Mathilda Perez, the ten-year-old girl with special powers; Nine Oh Two, a sentient free robot; and even Lurker, an obnoxious teenager techno-prankster who turns out to have a heroic side. They all make valuable contributions, and show humanity in a high-tech, inhuman war.
I especially appreciated Wilson's depiction of Archos the enemy AI, who is scary powerful but not omnipotent. His strengths and weaknesses are believable. His motives make sense. We feel empathy for him, as we must for any really good villain. Wilson does a great job showing all sides of the battle, and he definitely keeps the pages turning!
(Thanks to Rebecca Roanhorse for recommending this book in her excellent article "Postcards from the Apocalypse" https://uncannymagazine.com/article/p....)