bookhobbit (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bookhobbit) wrote2019-10-11 07:18 pm
bookhobbit) wrote2019-10-11 07:18 pm
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Book review: The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells
Won't be a long one probably? as I don't have a lot of spoons, but I finished the series last night and I really feel I've got to post Thoughts because I have Feelings.
Firstly: Martha Wells writes good! I checked out another of her books from the library and have just started it and even in fantasy novels her writing voice feels distinctive and contemporary in a nice way. The Murderbot Diaries are a bit more so, being first-person and very snarky. So on that level I just enjoy the writing style. Like most snarky first-person styles, it can sometimes be a little bit much, but I find that's hard to avoid in the style, so I cannot really blame the author.
It's set in the kind of Vaguely Inclusive Future that a lot of modern progressive scifi has - lots of characters who are incidentally queer and incidentally brown or black, without any of that being particularly relevant to the story. For stuff like that it can be a fine balance between shallow sorta-rep and just portraying a world where not everyone is a straight white cis person; I nevertheless find this kind of setting relatively relaxing as a queer person, though I obviously can't speak for PoC on it, because it's nice to think of a future where you don't have to be afraid.
Anyway....the main reason I wanted to review the book series is because GOOD GOOD GOOD ROBOT FEELS.
My favorite thing about Murderbot is that it doesn't want to be human and, in fact, being human is kind of the worst thing it (in-universe pronoun for all robot-type folks) can possibly imagine. I'm really weak for robot stories that subvert that particular trope, as much as I love Data.
My second favorite thing about murderbot is a) it doesn't have and is not interested in having sex; b) it doesn't have and isn't interested in romantic relationships; .c) it's touch-averse; d) it only wants to sit around and consume entertainment media all day; e) it doesn't have a gender. So in essence if you're, like me, an aro ace agender autie, BOY HAVE I GOT A SERIES FOR YOU. I know all four of those things are things that shouldn't be represented by robots because it's dehumanizing, but it's also powerfully difficult not to relate to this one. It hates eye contact, it doesn't want to be touched, it hates talking about emotions, it wants to be left alone. It processes emotions better through TV than through real life. Fictional universes giving you context for your emotions that you lack is.....a big thing for me. I mean, this book was doing this for me as I was reading it, so there's a nice loop for you.
Mm. What else. Uhhh there's a lot of emotionally complicated relationships that aren't romantic, which i really love. Murderbots feelings about Dr. Mensah in particular really Get Me.
I guess my only real complaint would be that the plots don't feel particularly...fleshed out? In the middle two books in particular, they feel like mere events on which to hang Murderbot's emotional plot arc. I'm honestly not mad about it. The emotional arc is REALLY good. But if you're really into detailed and complicated plots you're liable to find this unsatisfying.
Oh, something that I thought was really cool is Murderbot has organic parts, and the ways in which its organic parts interact with its mechanical parts is important to the plot several times -- sometimes to its detriment and sometimes to its benefit. It's a really cool bit of worldbuilding that you don't necessarily get all the time with this type of story. I would say the worldbuilding in general is pretty typical to what you'd find in your standard contemporary future scifi, so it'll be mostly pretty familiar stuff. This makes it slightly easier to absorb, though if you're looking for a fresh and exciting setting this will probably not be it. That's about all that I can say, really. I just really enjoyed them and they're one of the better things I've read these past few months.
Firstly: Martha Wells writes good! I checked out another of her books from the library and have just started it and even in fantasy novels her writing voice feels distinctive and contemporary in a nice way. The Murderbot Diaries are a bit more so, being first-person and very snarky. So on that level I just enjoy the writing style. Like most snarky first-person styles, it can sometimes be a little bit much, but I find that's hard to avoid in the style, so I cannot really blame the author.
It's set in the kind of Vaguely Inclusive Future that a lot of modern progressive scifi has - lots of characters who are incidentally queer and incidentally brown or black, without any of that being particularly relevant to the story. For stuff like that it can be a fine balance between shallow sorta-rep and just portraying a world where not everyone is a straight white cis person; I nevertheless find this kind of setting relatively relaxing as a queer person, though I obviously can't speak for PoC on it, because it's nice to think of a future where you don't have to be afraid.
Anyway....the main reason I wanted to review the book series is because GOOD GOOD GOOD ROBOT FEELS.
My favorite thing about Murderbot is that it doesn't want to be human and, in fact, being human is kind of the worst thing it (in-universe pronoun for all robot-type folks) can possibly imagine. I'm really weak for robot stories that subvert that particular trope, as much as I love Data.
My second favorite thing about murderbot is a) it doesn't have and is not interested in having sex; b) it doesn't have and isn't interested in romantic relationships; .c) it's touch-averse; d) it only wants to sit around and consume entertainment media all day; e) it doesn't have a gender. So in essence if you're, like me, an aro ace agender autie, BOY HAVE I GOT A SERIES FOR YOU. I know all four of those things are things that shouldn't be represented by robots because it's dehumanizing, but it's also powerfully difficult not to relate to this one. It hates eye contact, it doesn't want to be touched, it hates talking about emotions, it wants to be left alone. It processes emotions better through TV than through real life. Fictional universes giving you context for your emotions that you lack is.....a big thing for me. I mean, this book was doing this for me as I was reading it, so there's a nice loop for you.
Mm. What else. Uhhh there's a lot of emotionally complicated relationships that aren't romantic, which i really love. Murderbots feelings about Dr. Mensah in particular really Get Me.
I guess my only real complaint would be that the plots don't feel particularly...fleshed out? In the middle two books in particular, they feel like mere events on which to hang Murderbot's emotional plot arc. I'm honestly not mad about it. The emotional arc is REALLY good. But if you're really into detailed and complicated plots you're liable to find this unsatisfying.
Oh, something that I thought was really cool is Murderbot has organic parts, and the ways in which its organic parts interact with its mechanical parts is important to the plot several times -- sometimes to its detriment and sometimes to its benefit. It's a really cool bit of worldbuilding that you don't necessarily get all the time with this type of story. I would say the worldbuilding in general is pretty typical to what you'd find in your standard contemporary future scifi, so it'll be mostly pretty familiar stuff. This makes it slightly easier to absorb, though if you're looking for a fresh and exciting setting this will probably not be it. That's about all that I can say, really. I just really enjoyed them and they're one of the better things I've read these past few months.