Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Murderbot, why are you like this

System Collapse by Martha Wells

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  I love Murderbot. For someone who does not consider themselves a person, our SecUnit is still very relatable. When things get stressful, they love to retreat and re-watch their favourite TV shows. When I find everything getting a bit stressful, I retreat and read Murderbot. We’re not so different, really. System Collapse is the seventh book in the series and it directly follows the events of Network Effect—so the following review is going to be a bit spoiler-y by nature. When we were last with […]

Fugitive Telemetry

Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells

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Fugitive Telemetry is Murderbot’s bottle episode. Murderbot is adjusting to life within PreservationAux, and has been asked for its help in judging the extent of a security incident. Murderbot is forced to interact with people who know about sec units but haven’t had the chance to learn about this sec unit yet, and as such there is the usual prejudice and the attempts to make it seem like just a killing machine, which it also thinks it is, after all. This book is primarily just an […]

Network Effect

Network Effect by Martha Wells

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When my wife and I were reading Murderbot together for the first time, I couldn’t wait to get to Network effect. I knew it was a novel, so we’d get more content, I knew it had more ART and Murderbot, and I knew it was, just generally speaking, more of the storylines I’d become completely addicted to. It held up for the second readthrough. There’s a moment in this novel where one of the PreservationAux colonists is listening to Murderbot and ART angrily snipe at one […]

All Systems Red

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

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All Systems Red is the first book in the Murderbot Diaries, by a huge margin the most enjoyable sci-fi I’ve read in the past few years. It is simple, an easy read, hilarious, and since this is my second time through, holds up on a re-read. Murderbot is a SecUnit, a cyborg made from robotic parts and cloned tissues for use on the Corporation Rim, a loose conglomerate of corporate entities at the edge of space-faring civilization. Most corporations are complete assholes, with frequent use […]

Exit Strategy

Exit Strategy by Martha Wells

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Exit Strategy is the second of my two least favorite Murderbot stories, but I really need to put an asterisk on that because they’re still outstanding. Overall, I would say this one is the worst because it meanders the most. There’s a lot of Murderbot sitting around thinking about security protocols, and honestly that works, but it’s my “least” favorite because it has to stand in comparison to so much other incredibly good stuff. Murderbot returns to HaveRatton station just in time to be almost […]

Witches and Demons missing a little magic

Witch King by Martha Wells

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I wanted to like Witch King so much more than I did. It’s got some good characters (maybe a few too many though), good premise, but the pacing and sense of time are so off. Demon prince and witch pal awake to find a mage trying to syphon the demon’s magic (doesn’t go well for the mage) and then go on a quest to 1) find out how/why they were trapped (and for how long), and 2) find the witch’s spouse. Demons, including Kai, are […]



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