System Collapse (The Murderbot Diaries Book 7)

"Yes, this is the seventh work in the Murderbot Diaries series. The series has garnered awards galore: the first, All Systems Red , scooped the 2018 Hugo and Nebula for best novella, while the fifth (and first full-length novel), Network Effect , won the 2021 Hugo, Nebula and Locus for best novel. Wells has turned down several further nominations. It’s best that way, and All Systems Red is a lovely bite-sized place to start. The world-building is deft but dense, and the character relationships are a large part of the joy, so working through them in order is more rewarding. And System Collapse follows straight on from Network Effect. ‘Murderbot’ is the self-styled nickname of the protagonist, a former ‘SecUnit’ (security unit) robot that has slipped its control program and acts as an independent agent. It has a charmingly ambivalent relationship with the humans in its life, and a preference for spending time watching the thousands of hours of entertainment downloaded onto its system and being left alone. But, begrudgingly, it doesn’t actually want its humans to die. Not letting the humans die is complicated in System Collapse . Our heros vye with corporate interests for the future of a planet and its colonists, who for their part don’t know who to trust. Muderbot’s team consists of humans, augmented humans, robots with organic parts and pure AI, all with their own well-sketched relationships. It’s fun, it’s fast-paced, it’s delightfully sarcastic and world-weary – full of lines like “we proceeded down the stupid tunnel, into the stupid danger.” Murderbot is all of us, getting on with the jobs we have to do, and doing our best to get on with the people involved. In this novel, Murderbot’s narrative is frequently interrupted by <redacted>; you have to wait until about a third of the way in to learn why. It’s a new playful layer in an already playful narrative voice."