Some more high action martial arts sci fi bad-assery

books:


	• Thirteen Richard K. Morgan Del Rey, 2007 - 560 pages average customer review:based on 61 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

Fast paced and lengthy but not redundant

The setting of Richard K. Morgan's latest novel is far into the future, the year 2091 and beyond. Carl Marsalis has been engineered as a "thirteen" by the current government. He is arrested in a police sting and languishes in a high-security prison in Florida, uncertain if he will ever regain his freedom. While he is incarcerated, a chilling crime scene is discovered by COLIN, the law enforcement arm of government. Marsalis possesses abilities that the authorities do not have.

A space shuttle has crashed deep into waters within the New York City Police Department's jurisdiction. Its inhabitants have been brutally murdered, dismembered and cannibalized. The shuttle was en route to Earth from the outer planet, Mars, desolate home to prisoners, misfits and outcasts from Jesusland, the Rim states and former American landscapes.

The recovery operation is kept secret. There would be widespread panic in the streets if the truth about the agonizing deaths was made public. Additional senseless killings have surfaced throughout the country within a short time after the crash. COLIN officers suspect that these new cases are somehow related to the shuttle deaths. WHAT is to solve the brutal murders. WHO is the probability of a highly trained engineered prototype known as a thirteen. WHY remains the biggest unanswered question.

Sevgi Ertekin and her partner, Tom Norton, are the COLIN officers assigned to the destruction and devastation on Harkin's Pride. Built to withstand a crash landing on Mars, the downed ship had not been ocean-tested. Rim-state cops guard the scene when the two arrive. Convinced by the evidence that the perpetrator is insane, Eretkin and Norton feed all collected crime scene information into the path "face" for analysis. The face on the screen responds, "...salients are consistent with the perpetrator being a variant thirteen reengineered male."

Enter Marsalis, freed and now in service to Norton and Ertekin. Marsalis has the physical and mental capabilities to assist in the capture of a renegade thirteen. An investigation leads to the identity of Allen Merrin, whose resume reads like death-row statistics from Alcatraz. Marsalis's freedom depends on his ability to capture and eliminate Merrin, who is protected by an unknown entity difficult to penetrate. The chase takes them from South America to Turkey and numerous points between.

For those readers who consider science fiction to be among their favorite genres, THIRTEEN will be a barn-burner. Action moves with intercontinental speed. Vehicles are characterized as futuristic but believable. Thirteens are designed to inflict deadly force by brute strength alone but have at their command weaponry instilled with lethal ammunition. Marsalis operates by sheer strength, a virtual soldier, though his physical effectiveness may be compromised by a leak in his emotional armor.

Drug lords and mafia-type familias use thirteens for dirty work in the future world. It is said, "Cross the familias and they'll send a...thirteen to visit you." Fear of deportation to Mars no longer threatens Marsalis once he is determined to avenge the variant thirteen's bloody rampage.

THIRTEEN is fast paced and lengthy but not redundant. Morgan's characters are believable entities in a futuristic society because they are laced with emotions to which the contemporary reader can relate. We do care what happens to them, even to the engineered personality of our hero thirteen. Events are credible, from means of time-travel and outer-space transportation to weapons used in a future world. Fans of ALTERED CARBON will embrace this novel as a must-purchase for their sci-fi library. Morgan is a genius at holding the reader's attention, and storytelling mastery is his forte. THIRTEEN is his latest triumph.

--- Reviewed by Judy Gigstad

for more information click here

Some more high action martial arts sci fi bad-assery

I've read all of Richard Morgan's novels so far. Of course, the Takeshi Kovacs books are fantastic, and this novel doesn't challenge them as his best work. It is, however, still a lot of fun. Although I'm usually all snobby and literary about my fantasy and science fiction, a bit of drugged up, military grade martial arts with a nice little mystery to solve never hurts, and Richard Morgan delivers here.

Having read Market Forces, and enjoying it without loving it (just too bleak for me...believe it or not), this was a nice return to form.

The novel starts a little disjointedly, with a lot of POV swapping between chapters. It's not too bad, and once the story kicks in it's mostly hard-bitten angry men and sexy women shooting/beating 3 colours of snot out of various baddies. A lot of fun, actually. You do need to accept the premise of the novel, that a lot of human behaviour is more genetic than environmental, although the issue is questioned occasionally.

Interesting side note: this book was called 'black man' originally, which is a much more appropriate title. I am guessing some sort of racial paranoia forced it to be renamed for the US market...

Ah...Jesusland...

for more information click here

A change in direction...

While Morgan's previous work, the Takeshi Kovacs novels (Altered Carbon, Broken Angels and Woken Furies) explored the dehumanizing aspects of technology and the shattered remains they leave behind, this book takes a different path. In Thirteen/Black Man he uses the progression of technology to explore the base human desires and emotions that we all have, and turns them to 11. We must look into the mirror at our own inherent racism, sexism, propensity for violence and mortality.

He fleshes characters deeper than his other novels given more substance and form, inviting readers to emotionally invest in them. To this end, he has noted he has received some hate mail. The book... make you feel vulnerable, especially in one particular part which I will not reveal. Readers should be advised that this is *not* a Takeshi Kovacs novel... you are not along for the ride of an avenging angel, here you are a vouyer into the darker parts of humanity. However, I believe the work is more powerful for this. So few works these days ask us to think deeply, and I treasure the books like this one dare request us to.

for more information click here

Great read!

I loved all of Morgan's other books so I had to read this one. Well, this is my favorite so far (although, I just finished it so this judgment probably isn't fair to the other works). Morgan is a master of creating believable future worlds. While his protagonists are intentionally larger than life, each is fascinating. Based on entertainment value (and what other reason is there to read scifi?), this is a top choice.

reviews: 1, 2, 3, page 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

hot

not?

What's your opinion?

Write a review and share your thoughts!

recommendations

Gripping Horror to Read Late at Night
Crack Open a Good Horror Book Tonight
You Can't Judge a Book By it's Cover
Give These Horror Stories a Read
Read, Read, Read, End of Story

search for books
thirteen

Impressum / about us