Speculative Fiction Junkie

Charles Stross

Wow, look at that cover. I've never seen anything quite like it. I normally remove the dust jacket while I'm reading a hardcover book, and this habit served me well while I was reading Saturn's Children as it allowed me to avoid what I'm sure would have been some pointed questions from my fiance about what I was reading. In my defense, I saw the UK cover first.

Saturn's Children has an interesting premise. The solar system is now populated by robots that were created to serve humans before the latter became extinct. In humanity's absence, a majority of these service-oriented robots are ruled by a few "aristos." When the story's protagonist, a robot named Freya Nakamichi 47, runs afoul of one of them, she is forced to flee Venus. She soon takes on work as a courier for a corporation. Eventually, she gets entangled in a plot to recreate "pink goo," that is, human life. Because the robots are programmed to serve their Creators, the reemergence of humans would immediately destroy the aristos' power.

Mr. Stross does a great job of illustrating the dilemma of a creature created for a single purpose that can seemingly never be fulfilled. I didn't find any of the characters in this book very sympathetic but I did find myself occasionally feeling sorry for Freya and her kind. Another strength of this book is Stross' acknowledgment of scientific realities. For example, space travel between planets can take years in this book, as it would in reality. Overall, the science in Saturn's Children is internally consistent and interesting.

These strengths though could not offset the weaknesses of this novel for me. The main problem, in my opinion, is that the plot is confusing. Each robot's memories, skills, etc. can be stored on "soul chips," which are interchangeable with those of other robots. Additionally, Freya has siblings (which consist of those robots who were created from the same original as she was). Over the course of the book, Freya wears different soul chips and is constantly remembering things that are in fact memories of other siblings, the template robot from which she was derived, etc. Every few pages sees one of these remembrances and it makes the narrative very confusing.

Even in the absence of this confusion, however, I'm not sure I would have really enjoyed this book. The promise of the premise is never converted into a truly interesting story. I know that Mr. Stross is a well respected writer but I found getting through this novel to be somewhat of a chore.

Rating: 4/10

The True First

I'm somewhat confused about the true first in this case. I could have sworn that this book was first published in the UK, but the only dates I can find have the book first published in the United States by Ace on July 1, 2008, with the UK edition published by Orbit.



[This review was based on a review copy]