Neal Asher (Author)

Jul 082010

Neal asher lives on the sunny island of Crete (at least at the moment) with his wife and writes wonderful science fiction and he is one of my favorite authors.

Neal is a talented world builder in the borderlands of singularity and his characters are complex ‘real’ humans with regrets, guilt and feelings like the rest of us that makes it easy to relate to them. His novels are fast paced, easy to read and with complex plots. I started reading his agent Cormac series.

As far as I know he doesn’t have any aliases or pseudonyms he write under.

His next book The Technician come out in August,2010 and is on my pick for the rest of 2010. The Departure, the first book in his new Owner Sequence series will be published in 2011 probably in August. See my post on the upcoming novel.

Series

Polity Universe

The Polity where most humans live is governed by benign artificial intelligences. They took power when humanity’s wars started to get out of hand and they elected themselves not to go after Singularity. Then the Polity meets the Prador and a huge war breaks loose (Prador Moon). Ian Cormac is grows up during the war (Shadow of the Scorpion) and his grown up adventures as Polity Agent follows. Then follows the Splatterjay series and finally Hilldiggers.

Agent Cormac series

Wonderful series about a secret agent named Ian Cormac that includes a mysterious dragon, renegade AIs, genocide, ancient alien technology, sentient ships and spiffy gadgets.

0. Shadow of the Scorpion
1. Grindlinked (2001)
2. The Line of the Polity (2003)
3. Brass Man (2005)
4. Polity Agent (2006)
5. Line War (2006)

Splaterjay series

This is a series I am about to read, the books are on my 2010 summer reading plan

1. The Skinner (2002)
2. The Voyage of the Sable Keech (2006)
3. Orbus (2009)

Standalone Polity Novels

Prador moon
The Technician (Tor UK 2010)

New Series by Neal Asher The Departure (Owner Trilogy 1) October 13, 2010

Links

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5 Secret Agents in Science Fiction Litterature

Books 1 Response »

Jun 162010

Here are five secret agents for some easy summer reading. It is also my personal line of progression with secret agents in Scifi. As a kid I started out with Cap Kennedy along with other YA flavored SF like Perry Rhodan, the Dumarest Saga, Venus Prime and such.

Before reading Paul Anderson’s Flandry series of a far future where a crumbling and decadent empire need saving from crafty aliens. You can get the Dominic Flandry series in new omnibus releases, but they probably win the contest of bad covers (James Bond like man draped in nude/semi nude women).

I upped my game a bit when it came to secret agents with Morgan Roche in the Evergence Trilogy.

Cally was inherited from John Ringo’s Posleen series and I came to that from John Ring & David Weber’s excellent Prince Roger series (That one is still one of my favorites). I might in fact have read Neal Asher’s Agent Cormac series before Cally’s War but I wanted to finish with the best.

Enjoy!

Cap Kennedy of F.A.T.E

Author: Gregory Kern (pseudonym for Edwin Charles Tubb)

Cap Kennedy, is space opera in the style of Perry Rhodan. Known as F.A.T.E. in the UK (where only the first six books have ever been published), the novels follow the adventures of Captain Kennedy, an intergalactic investigator and Free Acting Terran Envoy (F.A.T.E.) of the Mobile Aid Laboratories and Construction Authorities (M.A.L.A.C.A.) who is assisted by his team of companions, engineer Penza Saratov, veteran scientist Professor Jarl Luden, and the human chameleon Veem Chemile. Tubb wrote 17 Cap Kennedy novels, all under the pseudonym Gregory Kern.

Dominic Flandry

Author: Poul Anderson

Dominic Flandry is the central character in the second half of Poul Anderson’s Technic History science fiction. He first appeared in 1951.

The space opera series is set in the thirty-first century, during the waning days of the Terran Empire. Flandry is a dashing field agent of the Imperial Intelligence Corps who travels the stars to fight off imminent threats to the empire from both external enemies and internal treachery. His long-time archenemy is Aycharaych, from the planet Chereion, a cultured but ruthless telepathic spymaster who weaves plots for the expansionistic rival empire of the alien Merseians. Similar to the James Bond stories (which started two years later), every new adventure brings Flandry another beautiful damsel to woo and rescue.

The illegitimate son of a minor nobleman, Flandry rises to considerable power within the decadent Empire by his own wits, and enjoys all the pleasures his position society gives him. Still he is painfully conscious of the impending fall of the Terran Empire and the subsequent “Long Night” of a galactic Dark Age. His career is dedicated to holding it off for as long as possible. In time, he passes the mantle to his daughter Diana, who is also illegitimate.

Flandry is willing to disregard conventional morality and use his foes’ tactics against them. He can cheerfully deceive, seduce, and blackmail; grimly and regretfully, he mind-probes his son into a vegetable in A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows, and in that same book, bombards Aycharaych’s homeworld of Chereion into radioactive ruin to punish Aycharaych for his part in fostering trouble in the marches of the empire.

Novels

Ensign Flandry (1966)
A Circus of Hells (1970)
The Rebel Worlds (1969)
A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows (1974)
A Stone in Heaven (1979)
The Game of Empire (1985)

Collections

Agent of the Terran Empire (1965)
Flandry of Terra (1965)

Morgan Roche

Author: Sean Williams & Shane Dix

Morgan Roche is an intelligence agent for the Commonwealth of Empires and the protagonist in the Evergence Trilogy.

The Prodigal Sun (1999)
The Dying Light (2000)
The Dark Imbalance (2001)

Cally O’Neal

Author: John Ringo

Co-written with Julie Cochrane, this series is more cloak and dagger spy genre fiction as the humans strive to overcome the game rigged by the Darhel race which has the rest of the galaxy’s races in virtual thralldom—except for the Posleen and humans whom they fear, while they systematically use humans to combat the Posleen while bleeding the humans when and where possible by underhanded clandestine acts to weaken future options of humanity.

Cally’s War Series

Cally’s War (2004) free online edition
Sister Time (2007) free online edition
Honor of the Clan (2009) free online edition

Hedren War

Eye of the Storm (2009) free online edition

Agent Ian Cormac

Author: Neal Asher

Ian Cormac is an agent for Earth Central Security and the protagonist for the Agent Cormac series. I recently reviewed the books here on Cybermage.

Agent Cormac Series

Shadow of the Scorpion (2010)
Grindlinked (2001)
The Line of the Polity (2003)
Brass Man (2005)
Polity Agent (2006)
Line War (2008)

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Line War by Neal Asher (Agent Cormac 5)

Books 3 Responses »

Jun 062010

The Polity is under attack from the renegade AI Orbus but the plan seems uncoordinated and random. What is the real plan? Polity agent Ian Cormac has to put all the pieces together in this concluding volume of the Cormac Saga. Here is my view.

Title: Line War
Series: Agent Cormac 5
Author: Neal Asher
Paperback: 496 pages
Genre: Space Opera | Military Science Fiction
Publisher: Tor 2008
Order by: Tor | Amazon US | UK | B&N | sfbok | tbd

The Polity is under attack from a ‘melded’ AI entity with control of the lethal Jain technology, yet the attack seems to have no coherence. When one of Erebus’ worm ships kills millions on the world of Klurhammon, a high-tech agricultural world of no real tactical significance, agent Ian Cormac is sent to investigate, though he is secretly struggling to control a new ability no human being should possess…and beginning to question the motives of his AI masters.

Further attacks and seemingly indiscriminate slaughter ensue, but only serve to bring some of the most dangerous individuals in the Polity into the war. Mr Crane, the indefatigable brass killing machine sets out for vengeance, while Orlandine, a vastly-augmented haiman who herself controls Jain technology, seeks a weapon of appalling power and finds allies from an ancient war. Meanwhile Mika, scientist and Dragon expert, is again kidnapped by that unfathomable alien entity and dragged into the heart of things: to wake the makers of Jain technology from their five-million-year slumber.

But Erebus’ attacks are not so indiscriminate, after all, and could very well herald the end of the Polity itself…

Information

This is the final Cormac Novel as far as I know, the ending is open but with good closure so there might be future stories. There are three important points of view in the story Cormac’s, Mika’s and Vulture’s.

Agent Cormac is as usual the main protagonist. Mika is Cormac’s love interest and the one the Dragon choose to communicate with. Vulture is again a ship accompanying Mr Crane.

World building

As usual Neal build a coherent well thought out future world as the setting for his story. The Polity is one of the better ones I have seen and I like that it is not the perfect world, it got flaws and the players human, haimen and ai’s all have their weaknesses.

Plot

Orbus makes his play for the Polity with massive diversion attacks along the Line while he hold his real plan a secret. I thought that part was well thought out and was believable as was the Polity AI’s responses. Here you get mighty space battles with huge loses of life and equipment. It disturbs me a bit the casual way thousands of deaths is treated but then I realize that is exactly the way emotionless machines would see it.

All the players are being played in true spy thriller tradition and each step in the plot reveals deceit after deceit until the true players are revealed in the end.

Cormac tries to understand the randomness of the attacks together with his drone sidekick and Jerusalem. They start to make progress when they get help from an unlikely source.

Mika’s sejour with the Dragon is an amazing thrilling journey to the roots of the Jain technology and the gruesome deceit at its bottom.

Characterization

This is a story about revelations and Cormac has fears that he might be an avatar of some distant AI like Horace Blegg especially with his newfound powers. That question keeps us in suspense up until the end.

I love the characters even the ones on the ‘evil’ side. I would have liked a bit more on Cormac and Mika but then I am a sucker for love.

My View

Line War is a good ending to the Cormac Saga. The onion is pealed, the truths revealed and the guilty punished what more is there? Well, there is an opening for future Cormac stories but I haven’t scryed any such intensions from Mr Asher. I have been taken in by the Polity universe so I have The Skinner and The Voyage of the Sable Keech marked down for summer reading.

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Polity Agent by Neal Asher (Agent Cormac 4)

Books 3 Responses »

Jun 052010

Polity agent Ian Cormac returns from the near death experience at the end of the last novel Brass Man. This time he gets a message from the future and more sinister secrets are revealed as he has to track down the ones responsible for spreading Jain nodes in the Polity.

Title: Polity Agent
Series: Agent Cormac 4
Author: Neal Asher
Cover art: Steve Rawlings
Genre: Space Opera | Military Science Fiction
Publisher: Tor / PanMacMillan 2006
Paperback: 496 pages
Order by: Tor | Amazon US | UK | B&N | Sfbok | tbd

From 800 years in the future, a runcible gate is opened into the Polity and those coming through it have been sent specially to take the alien ‘Maker’ back to its home civilization in the Small Magellanic cloud. Once these refugees are safely through, the gate itself is rapidly shut down – because something alien is pursuing them. The gate is then dumped into a nearby sun. From those refugees who get through, agent Cormac learns that the Maker civilization has been destroyed by pernicious virus known as the Jain technology. This, of course, raised questions: Why was Dragon, a massive biocontruct of the Makers, really sent to the Polity? And, Why did a Jain node suddenly end up in the hands of someone who could do the most damage with it? Meanwhile an entity called the Legate is distributing pernicious Jain nodes …and a renegade attack ship, The King of Hearts, has encountered something very nasty outside the Polity itself.

Information

ECS Agent Ian Cormac is the protagonist in this fourth Cormac novel.

World building

The story takes place in an universe where benign artificial intelligences rule the Polity where most of humanity reside. The border of the Polity is called the Line and most of the story takes place on or around the Line. ‘The greatest benefits for the most’ are the guiding principle for the Polity and that wakes some deep moral questions.

Horace Blegg’s storyline reveals more of the inner workings of the beings that governs the Polity. All is not peachy among the AI’s as we saw in Brass Man. There are fractions that wants to leave the humans and pursue Jain technology for themselves. One such AI, the warship The King of Hearts goes searching for the AIs that left the Polity at the end of the Prador war to pursue Singularity but he finds something much more frightening.

Plot

In this fast paced story of sinister secrets, mighty space battles and suspenseful adventure Polity agent Ian Cormac has to track down and stop the spread of Jain technology in the Polity and find out who is behind it.

The alien civilization-killing Jain technology is like an onion layer after layer is revealed the further we dive into the series. Now we start to see a bigger picture and how the different players tie in to each other. Who and what the Dragon is and his real mission to our galaxy; Who the Legate is and who is maneuvering behind the scene.

Characterization

Ian Cormac’s progression from emotionless field agent towards a whole human continues and we get to see much more human interaction between him and his associates. Many of the characters from the previous books are back and take on bigger parts like Mika and Thorn.

As always Neal Asher provide delightful and easy to love characters like the war drone who is gagging for a fight after years of boredom and routine. There are also new ships to get to know.

My View

Polity Agent is an intelligent space opera which ponder some big questions like death, identity of self and the dangers of new technology framed in suspenseful and entertaining adventure. You should read the previous books in the series before this one, you won’t be disappointed.

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Brass Man by Neal asher (Agent Cormac 3)

Books 2 Responses »

Jun 032010

Interstellar agent Cormac is back with another intrepid adventure featuring ancient alien technology, a dragon hunting knight and a presumed dead enemy returning with a familiar man of brass. Here is my review.

From the Philip K. Dick Award nominee author of Cowl, an adrenaline-powered new SF adventure: Brass Man. Neal Asher returns to his trademark Polity future setting, in a sequel to Gridlinked, which SFRevu.com called “brilliant and audacious work, chock-full of cutting-edge ideas.”

Ian Cormac, a legendary Earth Central Security agent, the James Bond of a wealthy future, is hunting an interstellar dragon, little knowing that, far away, his competition has resurrected an horrific killing machine named “Mr. Crane” to assist in a similar hunt, ecompassing whole star systems. Mr. Crane, the insane indestructible artificial man now in a new metal body, seeks to escape a bloody past he can neither forget nor truly remember. And he is on a collision course with Ian Cormac.

Information

The story takes off where Line of the Polity ended. Agent Cormac momentary believe he has vanquished Skellor and his alien infestation when he destroyed his ship.

The story is told on two time lines, one is retroacts of Golem Twenty-five who later becomes Mr Crane’s origin and the other is the now.

Cormac is the protagonist with his own point of view, Skellor our antagonist is another and a third and new character is the knight and dragon killer Anderson Endrik on the primitive world of Cull. A world that just happens to host the Dragon.

The storyline is as usual intelligent and complex, maybe a little too much divided into subplots as it made it easier to put it down than the previous books.

World building

The Polity continues to chisel out and the world of Cull intrigues me. There is more of the inner workings of the Polity and the AI’s version of politics in this novel. The technologies and ideas in Neal’s universe start to feel familiar here in the third book, I have included them in my mindset but there are more surprises around the corner.

Plot

Skellor isn’t dead, instead he hides and search for new allies. Cormac partner up with a rather amusing warship AI named Jack Ketch and Aphran, the spirit of a Separatist rebel ghost tortured to death by Skellor.

Skellor is like an addict with the alien Jain nano technology and he resurrect Mr Crane thinking of using him against Cormac but there might be more motivating him that he is not conscious of. Then he goes off to see the Dragon on Cull subverting the minds of the local community at the same time really friendly like. But he doesn’t have as much control over the Jain as he thinks.

Meanwhile the Polity is trying to figure the Jain technology out. Mika and the quirky AI slash science vessel Jerusalem first have to deal with the infected and then continue with some rather risky experiments before joining the action on Cull.

The Golem twenty-five back story and the eventual desert march of Mr Crane is the theme of the book. He was made crazy and he now tries to find sanity again in his divided minds. Bloody and gory at times it is still a thought-worthy tale about the mechanics of the mind.

Characterization

The characters are rational and make sense inside their perceived reality and I as a reader understands where they are at. Cormac is still suffering from being hooked up to the AIs for thirty years but he is getting more and more human. I like that with the characters; they have more than the usual space opera or secret agent persona while still being fun and attractive to read.

Beside Anderson I think I liked Vulture best of the new characters. Vulture is the surviving AI from Occam Razor given a vulture body by the Dragon.

My View

I must admit I stumbled a bit at times with the multi faceted split vision story telling the first time I read it, give it time, it is worth it. Every Cormac novel adds a level to the mystery of the Dragon and the ancient Jain technology and in Brass Man you start to glimpse the bigger picture. It also gives a good closure to an important but now minor part of the sinister mysteries ahead. You should read at least Gridlinked and The Line of the Polity before this one; I would not recommend it as a standalone novel. Great homage to the man of Brass Mr Crane himself and another fast paced Nano thriller about Polity trouble shooter Cormac.

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