Saturn's Children by Charles Stross

The Barnes & Noble Review

When science fiction fans wax nostalgic for the novels of Robert A. Heinlein, they are more likely to have Stranger in a Strange Land, Starship Troopers, or his celebrated juveniles in mind than the solipsistic, arguably misogynistic books that appeared at the tail end of his career. Leave it to Charles Stross, author of Accelerando and Halting State, to find a fresh way to pay homage to late-period Heinlein in a space opera with decidedly 21st-century sensibilities. Saturn's Children uses Heinlein's 1982 novel Friday as its template, chronicling the solar system–spanning adventures of Freya Nakamichi 47, a femmebot designed for the carnal pleasures of her human masters. Unfortunately, humans died off two centuries ago, leaving Freya and her robotic siblings at extremely loose ends. On the run from aristocratic slaveowners with a grudge, the comely android takes a job as a courier, carrying a mysterious package in her abdomen from Mercury to Mars. En route, Freya finds herself imprinted with the memories of one of her missing sisters, falls in love with the wrong artificial person, and discovers unsettling secrets about the original model in her line. This overly complicated stand-alone novel never quite achieves the sublime lunacy or the mind-bending inventiveness of its author's best work. But rather like the book that inspired it, Saturn's Children offers more than its fair share of action, humor, artful extrapolation, and intriguing discourses on the nature of free will. --Michael Berry

From the Publisher

Freya Nakamichi-47 is a femmebot, one of the last of her kind still functioning. With no humans left to pay for the pleasures she provides, she agrees to transport a mysterious package from Mercury to Mars-only to become hunted by some very powerful humanoids who will stop at nothing to possess the contents of the package.

Gardner Dozois

Where Charles Stross goes today, the rest of science fiction will follow tomorrow. (Gardner Dozois, Editor, Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine)

New York Times

The act of creation seems to come easily to Charles Stross...He is peerless at dreaming up devices that could conceivably exist in 6, 60, or 600 years' time.

Denver Post

Stross sizzles with ideas.

SF Revu

Charles Stross may be the science fiction field's most exciting writer.

Publishers Weekly

Sex oozes from every page of this erotic futuristic thriller. In a far-future class-driven android society, most of the populace are slave-chipped and owned by wealthy "aristos." When low-caste but unenslaved android Freya offends an aristo and needs to get off-world, she takes a courier position with the mysterious Jeeves Corporation, but the job turns out to have dangers of its own. Designed as a pleasure-module, Freya isn't quite as obsolete as she could be, as androids have sex with each other incessantly. Hugo-winner Stross (Halting State) has a deep message of how android slavery recapitulates humanity's past mistakes, but he struggles to make it heard over the moans and gunshots. Readers nostalgic for the SF of the '60s will find much that's familiar (including Freya's jumpsuit-clad form on the cover), but that doesn't quite compensate for the flaws. (July)

Jackie Cassada - Library Journal

After the extinction of the human race in the 23rd century, robots and androids continue to function, forming their own stratified society to carry out their creators' dreams of space colonization. Freya Nakamichi 47-a femmebot designed as a concubine for a race that no longer exists-occupies a place in society midway between the elite Aristos and the slave-chipped worker robots. Having to make her own way, she accepts a commission to deliver a small package from Mercury to Mars, unaware of the trouble that awaits her as humanoid factions vie for the contents of the package. The author of Singularity Sky and The Atrocity Archives always brings a fresh perspective to the genre, reinventing the future in bold new ways. Part space opera, part homage to late sf Grand Masters Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov, this tale of a very "human" android belongs in most sf collections.

Product Details