The Engineer ReConditioned by Neal Asher

What I particularly dislike is that his ideas are cool but it's also quite clear he's not a scientist and hence can't explain any of the 'super-science' he uses and relies on as plot devices, so I would classify him in the 'thriller' genre rather than the science fiction genre. I think Asher needs novel-length space in order to strut his stuff and ideas. Nevertheless, the parasites are at least interesting, though I suspect the source material is more interesting than Asher's stories.Īll in all, I can't recommend this book. Asher has a low opinion of religion (as do I), so I'm not sure how well these will go over with anyone who doesn't already agree with those views. There's also a time travel story that is OK, but not even close to being as good as Palimpsest, still the best time travel story I've read.įinally, there are two stories about parasites and religion.

These are much less compelling, as the 'Owner' always feels more like a deus ex machina than a proper story hook. Then there came a sequence of 'Owner' stories, effectively stories about a super-human intelligence that controls a planet that humans have chosen to settle on. The clash of causes explored was entertaining, but did not have sufficient time to develop. I enjoyed the story quite a bit, even though it was quite predictable what would happen. The opening story, 'The Engineer' explores the discovery of a survivor of an extinct civilization. Caught between the byzantine wiles of the Dragon and the lethal fury of Pelter, Cormac needs to skip very nimbly indeed to rescue the Samarkand project and protect his own life.Gridlinked is the first sci-fi thriller in Neal Asher's compelling Agent Cormac series.Neal Asher's Gridlinked was a lot of fun, so I checked out The Engineer ReConditioned from the library to see if his short stories were up to par.

Despite the sub-zero temperature of Samarkand, Cormac discovers signs of life: they are two 'dracomen', alien beasts contrived by an extra-galactic entity calling itself 'Dragon', which is a huge creature consisting of four conjoined spheres of flesh each a kilometre in diameter. But Cormac has incurred the wrath of a vicious psychopath called Pelter, who is prepared to follow him across the galaxy with a terrifying android in tow. Agent Cormac must reach it by ship to begin an investigation. The runcible buffers on Samarkand have been mysteriously sabotaged, killing many thousands and destroying a terraforming project. Widescreen, action-packed science-fiction drama by a notable talent.In outer space you can never feel sure that your adversary is altogether human.

The Engineer ReConditioned by Neal Asher