One of my friends, a librarian, recommended these books by Wells which are collectively known as The Murderbot Diaries. Somehow I never got around to reading them. Then when the pandemic began and she recommended them again, I listened and I am so glad I did! They are intriguing, thoughtful and thoroughly satisfying and I am looking forward to reading all six of them!

A team of exploratory scientists lands on a planet to do a survey of its features and make an assessment of its scientific value and worth. All such survey and exploratory missions are regulated and approved by the Company who sends its own security androids to monitor and protect the survey teams.

What no one, not even the Company or the survey team realizes is that the SecUnit in charge of security for this team is not all that it seems.

“I could have become a mass murderer after I hacked my governor module, but then I realized I could access the combined feed of entertainment channels carried on the company satellites. It had been well over 35,000 hours or so since then, with still not much murdering….As a heartless killing machine, I was terrible failure.”

Hopelessly addicted to the long running serial drama, Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon, Murderbot, as it calls itself, was going through the motions of its security job.

Then a sudden attack by a an unknown planetary predator occurs during the Survey Team’s outside assessment. With heroic strength and ingenuity Murderbot saves the team members who were attacked and manages to get the whole team to safety. But in its review of the incident later, Murderbot notices buried in the various streamed orders, instructions it had received during the incident, an “abort” order in the HubSystem command feed that controlled, or believed it controlled, it’s governor module.

As other strange anomalies and incidents begin occurring the Survey Team and Murderbot realize that they are under attack from unknown assailants. When the neighboring survey team goes dark, they realize that they must stop whoever or whatever is behind these attacks before it is too late.

Wells has created a wonderful character in Murderbot. It is a bit scornful of humanity, dreadfully shy, and all robotic and focused on the job, and yet there is a stirring of consciousness, and a growing empathy for the people it is protecting and slowly it is changing into someone. Wells also creates a wonderful world landscape, and of life far in the future where space exploration has become routinized and a normal fact of life. Winner of many well deserved awards, The Murderbot Diaries, with most of its volumes at novella sized length are easily accessible and a wonderful escape!

Brenda’s Rating: ****(4 Out of 5 Stars)

Recommend this book to: Lauren, Marian, Keith and Ken

Book Study worthy? Yes

Read in ebook format.