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Over the weekend, I finished up Broken Angels. I had read Richard Morgan's first work and rather liked it, so I thought I'd give the sequel a go.
One of the things I liked about the original novel was the idea of stacks and sleeves. In this future world, humans have implanted a stack into their spinal column that allows their entire mental being to be captured to disk. Such technology opens the possibility of the consciousness surviving the death of a body -- which in this world happens regularly, as a person trades their current body for a new sleeve with regularity.
So how to create a sense of danger in a world where death doesn't mean the end? Morgan manages to pull off the tension with aplomb. By necessity, the motivations of characters are greatly different in this world, but not so different that everything is completely foreign.
In Broken Angels, the lead character from Carbon (Takeshi Kovacs) is back, this time leading a cadre of soldiers in some war (the details aren't particularly forthbomind or, indeed, pertinent). While there, he is approached by an unsavory lot about the existence of an alien spacecraft.....
Altered Carbon is a better read than Broken Angels, but either book is a worthwhile pulp read. I'd recommend it if you are into SF.
Posted by Casper at May 27, 2004 01:42 PMBrains on disks... Don't sound very fun. Probably more interesting are heart-transplant patients--what's that like? I'd say a abrain without a heart is pretty useless.
Posted by: Peter James at May 29, 2004 02:41 AMThat could be interesting; do you have any fictional works on heart-transplant patients that you would recommend?
Posted by: Casper at May 29, 2004 11:30 AM