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mburnamfink 's review for:
Spin State
by Chris Moriarty
Catherine Li is a UN Operative with a capital O, doing whatever wetwork is required out on the interplanetary frontier to keep humanity safe. And there's a lot of work that needs doing. While people back home in the metropole enjoy arts, culture, and fine food, the survival of baselines humans rests on a narrow beam above the tumultuous posthuman clades of artificial intelligences and genetic syndicates composed of indoctrinated clones bred to endure the rigors of space. UN superiority is maintained by their control of the FTL communication and transport grid, which requires precious Bose-Einstein condensate crystals from Compton's World, mined from coal veins with backbreaking labor.
After a mission goes wrong, Li is given a chance to redeem herself by carrying out an investigation/coverup on Compton's World. The UN's greatest physicist, Hannah Sharrif, and the local UN security chief, died along with hundreds of miners in a subterranean fire that seems linked, in some way, to Sharrif's experiments to find a synthetic replacement for Bose-Einstein condensate crystals. The job is a viper's pit of intrigue, and one that has brought Li back to a planet that she has tried very hard to forget.
Because Sharrif and Li are genetically identical, both from the same clone line, separated by 20 years. But while Sharrif has risen as a scientist against human racism, Li has a fabricated past that says she is only a quarter genetic construct, enough to pass the blood purity laws and work as a spy and soldier. Her augmented genetics have been boosted by specialist cybernetic hardware, making her a posthuman weapon, one who has been aimed by hidden hands, but may take control of her own path.
This book fires on all cylinders: Technothriller infiltration sequences shine, and don't outstay their welcome. Compton's World is a vivid Dickensian nightmare of coal dust and child labor, with a few thousand impoverished and exploited workers propping up prosperity for billions. By far my favorite parts of the book involved Cohen, a centuries old AI who sometimes works with Li on UN projects, but always on his own agenda. Cohen is a sybaritic humanophile, who's elegance and love of the finer things in life conceals an entirely alien intelligence. This is not a story about science and war and politics, though there is plenty of that. This is a love story, to it's quantum entangled core.
The hard scifi is full of provocative ideas, the characters are great, the world-building and plot well-trodden but executed with verve. 20 years on is a great time to read this book, and I'm excited for the rest of the series.
After a mission goes wrong, Li is given a chance to redeem herself by carrying out an investigation/coverup on Compton's World. The UN's greatest physicist, Hannah Sharrif, and the local UN security chief, died along with hundreds of miners in a subterranean fire that seems linked, in some way, to Sharrif's experiments to find a synthetic replacement for Bose-Einstein condensate crystals. The job is a viper's pit of intrigue, and one that has brought Li back to a planet that she has tried very hard to forget.
Because Sharrif and Li are genetically identical, both from the same clone line, separated by 20 years. But while Sharrif has risen as a scientist against human racism, Li has a fabricated past that says she is only a quarter genetic construct, enough to pass the blood purity laws and work as a spy and soldier. Her augmented genetics have been boosted by specialist cybernetic hardware, making her a posthuman weapon, one who has been aimed by hidden hands, but may take control of her own path.
This book fires on all cylinders: Technothriller infiltration sequences shine, and don't outstay their welcome. Compton's World is a vivid Dickensian nightmare of coal dust and child labor, with a few thousand impoverished and exploited workers propping up prosperity for billions. By far my favorite parts of the book involved Cohen, a centuries old AI who sometimes works with Li on UN projects, but always on his own agenda. Cohen is a sybaritic humanophile, who's elegance and love of the finer things in life conceals an entirely alien intelligence. This is not a story about science and war and politics, though there is plenty of that. This is a love story, to it's quantum entangled core.
The hard scifi is full of provocative ideas, the characters are great, the world-building and plot well-trodden but executed with verve. 20 years on is a great time to read this book, and I'm excited for the rest of the series.