Rogue Protocol, by Martha Wells

Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


By the third installment of this series the protagonist is growing a bit, though he (it? they? Murderbot presents as male but does not seem to have any interior masculine talk) is still kind of one-dimensional as far as I am concerned. These are simple books with simple plots, but they do have a lot of well-constructed action sequences that make for an exciting read. Am happy to have picked it up. It would be interesting if she started doing more to work through how Murderbot is neither male nor female, and how that interacts with its vicarious (but growing more personal) interest in emotions.



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Time Was, by Ian McDonald

Time Was by Ian McDonald

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I was fortunate enough to not read the misleading book blurb or the Goodreads spoiler blurb. Letting the book tell you about itself is probably the best way to experience it. That said, I kind of liked it but did not love it. It is a book-based time-travel/gay romance/mystery that unfolds pretty slowly and ends in a mild but not earthshaking twist. Our main character is kind of feckless for most of the book, and his semi-helpless singlemindedness is somewhat hard to like. It's a very literary book in a genre that doesn't value literature over ideas, so...hard to get excited about it, but I'm not sorry I read it.



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Tomorrow's Kin, by Nancy Kress

Tomorrow's Kin by Nancy Kress

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is about a 3.7 rounded up. I for one think Nancy Kress is getting better as she writes more. This is an excellent expansion on Yesterday's Kin, with a lot of satisfying plot twists. The early part will look familiar to those who read number 0.5, but the story is taken further and effectively delivered. Socially it's very current, extrapolating on our current inability to face any sort of disagreeable fact with anything more than a knee-jerk blaming of someone identifiably Other. But there's some perspicacious breakdown of that reaction, also--it's harder to be reasonable when you have lost someone close to you, or have no room for setbacks. Having the "Denebs" be fully human, including acting that way, is leaving lots of room for good storytelling. I'm pretty sure I'll be back for the next one.



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