Artificial Condition

By: Martha Wells

Narrated by: Kevin R. Free

The follow-up to the hugely popular science fiction action-adventure All Systems Red

Artificial Condition continues The Murderbot Diaries, a science fiction series that tackles questions of the ethics of sentient robotics. It appeals to fans of Westworld, Ex Machina, Ann Leckie's Imperial Raadch series, or Iain M. Banks' Culture novels. The main character is a deadly security droid that has bucked its restrictive programming and is balanced between contemplative self-discovery and an idle instinct to kill all humans. "As a heartless killing machine, I was a complete failure."

It has a dark past - one in which a number of humans were killed. A past that caused it to christen itself "Murderbot." But it has only vague memories of the massacre that spawned that title, and it wants to know more.

Teaming up with a Research Transport vessel named ART (you don't want to know what the "A" stands for), Murderbot heads to the mining facility where it went rogue.

What it discovers will forever change the way it thinks.

©2018 Martha Wells (P)2018 Recorded Books

Murderbot’s Inner Life is Oddly Compelling

Here’s the unexpected gift of this series: a determinedly non-human cybernetic construct wrestles with the same existential angst as we humans. The result is, by turns, curious, endearing and chilling. Martha Wells is a treasure I hope to continue to benefit from. Kevin R. Free’s narration is serviceable, if uninspired. Perhaps...just what the character needs.

Murderbot's next adventure

Murderbot is traveling to the place where the critical events that set him on the path to life as a rogue security unit happened: the mining colony where, under circumstances he does not remember because his memory was wiped, he killed a large number of the clients he was supposed to protect. He wants to know what really happened. He's passing as an augmented human, but telling the ships he travels with that he's a free construct, traveling to rejoin his guardian.

On the second leg of his trip, he finds the bot running the ship is an AI of both very high intelligence, and very high autonomy--and quite capable of doing major damage to him.

From this point, we get an intriguing mix of the developing relationship between Murderbot and the ship's bot, whom he calls Art, Murderbot's investigation of his own past, to learn why and how he came to kill all those clients, and his first venture into interacting with humans as an independent being, taking on a contract as a security consultant for a small research group that's traveling to his own destination.

It's fun, it's intriguing, and we get a surprising amount of character development in not very much space. Extremely well done, and well worth your time.

Recommended.

I bought this audiobook.

Too short!! Big fan of ART

The novella is honestly too short to be published separately. I am a huge fan of ART!

Great stuff!!

These may be shorter than most audiobooks I listen to, but they are certainly absorbing and quality entertainment! I love that Murderbot is changing -- I can't wait for the next one.

Loved it.

Love the story and love the performance. The voices are so spot on. Can't wait to listen to book 3.