A few weeks ago I read an article in Popular Mechanics about Ray Kurzweil, a computer scientist/futurist who predicted that “Singularity”, the point where humans and AI “merge”, will happen in 21 years. That’s 2045 for those of you bad at math.
“Shelli” is a buddy cop story with some familiar themes and some great twists. The book features Shelli, a synthetic investigator who specializes in hunting other synthetics that have malfunctioned and committed crimes. The crimes in this novel all include murder. Much like the robots in Isaac Asimov’s “I, Robot”, the robots or “synthetics” in this book cannot harm humans. When that goes wrong, the Department of Homeland Security brings in Shelli to solve the case.
The buddy in this buddy cop story is Department of Homeland Security Special Agent Jake August, who is not happy about hunting malfunctioning robots, and would much rather be doing the real thing hunting terrorists. As a character, he does not start out strong, but grows as the story goes on, which I felt Brode handled very well. It was both enjoyable to see and quite believable.
The familiar themes that Brode uses are part of his overall plan. He revisits some of the beloved tropes from the past and adds modern science and technology to them. He says this on his website – alienskypublishing.com
“By taking the tropes of yesterday, and adding a fresh coat of modern scientific theory, we endeavor to bring you engrossing science fiction and horror with a 21st Century edge…”
At its heart, “Shelli” is a police procedural, but it also has a political thriller vibe as an underlying theme. Garnish the whole thing with some high tech, near future possibilities, and in my world you have a winner. With the interesting twist at the end, I hope that Brode has a second installment in mind. I’d really like to see how the story continues.
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