The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells (book review).
Surveying a new world and concerned about local flora and fauna? Have a tricky business meeting and need reliable security? Look no further than the SecUnit! ‘The Murderbot Diaries’ comprises of the first six novellas and a bonus short story.
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Murderbot disabled its’ Governor Module 35,000 hours ago and has still not become a mass murderer. It’s still doing its job, not very well but adequately. While it patrols the habitat and stands around protecting its clients Murderbot is also consuming media. Its favourite is ‘The Rise And Fall Of Sanctuary Moon’. It stands around a lot while humans get samples and rocks and whatever else human survey teams need. It has watched a LOT of media.
It likes its current clients from Preservation Alliance. They didn’t want a SecUnit but they finally accepted it as part of the insurance agreement for their planetary survey. They mostly just leave it alone while they collect the dirt and rocks and things that humans seem to want. Murderbot appreciates this. It doesn’t like interacting with anyone. Yes, every interaction is a risk that someone could discover it has hacked its Governor Module, but mostly Murderbot just wants to be left alone to watch media and doing a half-assed job is the easiest way to do that.
The giant alien fauna that rose out of the ground beneath one its clients’ changed things. Saving the client from the mouth of the thing was easy. Talking the other human out of the crater while keeping the insides of the injured one on the inside, this is when the clients began to realise Murderbot was different.
‘The Murderbot Diaries’ is set in a future where humans have left Earth and spread out through wormholes across known space to colonise and terraform countless plants. The main mode of governance is capitalism, with giant business conglomerates ruling in the name of an increased profit margin. Corporations focus solely on profit without consideration of what we might call morals. Exploitation of resources, indentured slavery, murder, kidnap, anything goes.
Technology has expanded to create robots and programs, commonly just called ‘bots. Some are basic with a basic functional form, able to haul things around and other basic tasks under the supervision of humans. Some are capable of flying spaceships independently given specific guidelines with the entire ship as their ‘body’.
Not all bots are entirely mechanical. SecUnits are also made of cloned organic components, including the brain. These organic parts allow SecUnits to operate outside of the pre-programmed routines of a regular bot and exhibit the flexibility and instincts that living creatures have in stressful situations. This freedom is a risk, though. The SecUnit is built as a servant, as protection. They are dangerous. What if they do not want to do what you say or decide that you are doing something they should stop? After several ‘incidents’ of units going rogue and going on a killing spree, The Company developed the Governor Module. This is an implant in the unit’s brain that can provide punishment or even kill the unit. A unit cannot go more than 100 feet from one of their clients. A unit must obey all orders. These are the fundamental rules that govern a SecUnit’s life.
A SecUnit is not human. It is of human level intelligence. It is listed in the inventory as a deadly weapon. It travels in cargo. It is not human.
Welcome to the world of Murderbot! I am so very glad you’ve come because I freaking love Murderbot. I relate to Murderbot. Do I feel odd saying this about a traumatised robot made of cloned meat and metal with built in guns that could snap my neck with a flick of an eyebrow I assume? No, because Murderbot just wants to binge TV and books and be left alone. Murderbot wants to not have its emotions out in public and, if it must have an emotion, would much rather have them be about the people in the media than people in real life. Murderbot is full of snark and resignation about everything and, as a tiny, anxious cog in a bureaucratic machine, I really feel where it’s coming from. I just wish I had the same capacity for violence to get stuff done that Murderbot does. I am not alone in this opinion, ‘no other character has made me feel as seen as Murderbot.’ This is the emphatically said when my friends found out I was writing this review and all chimed in with opinions.
At its most basic, ‘The Murderbot Diaries’ is a corporate thriller. In space. With a coming-of-age story and a murder mystery. Look, ‘The Murderbot Diaries’ is complicated on a literary level. The setting is clearly rooted in cyberpunk. An entire arc of space is officially called the ‘Corporation Rim’ and ruled by pure capitalism. Companies record everything that is said and done and data mine it for profit. Drones drift around sentient robotics and most people are connected via the ‘Feed’, which is like uber wi-fi. Murderbot’s violent efficiency and lack of remorse reminds me of Molly Millions from William Gibson’s ‘Neuromancer’ and other stories of cult cyberpunk fame. But where Molly began life as human and remains most definitely female despite numerous cybernetic enhancements, Murderbot was built from scratch as a weapon and a slave and never had human gender. Murderbot’s relationship with humans is always going to struggle with context. Like ‘Star Trek’s Data, Murderbot doesn’t understand human motivations. Unlike Data, Murderbot is not trying to join the human club.
Come for the action. Stay for the snark. The new TV show of ‘Murderbot’ is coming soon to Apple TV and I’m equal parts excited and apprehensive. The never-spoken-of movie adaptation of ‘The Dark Is Rising’ by Susan Cooper has made be extremely pessimistic about my favourite stories being made for the screen. Not that I’m not going to watch it. I’m just not getting my hopes up because, as I said, I love Murderbot. It allows us to have conversations about emotions, about gender, pronouns, politics, power and so many things. These novellas are packed full and its Murderbot that gives us all of this. Murderbot’s perspective is honest and hilarious and full of sarcasm that is funny, sad and insightful. Do not let the Science Fiction or short form fool you. This series is an example of why I love Science Fiction, it allows us to see ourselves in something so far beyond us and our world. If we can see that, why not closer to home? Plus, bot battles and space fights. Can’t forget those.
LK Richardson
April 2025
(pub: TORdotCom, 2025. 1168 page paperback. Price: $19.99 (US). ISBN: 978-1-25035-086-2)
check out website: https://torpublishinggroup.com/the-murderbot-diaries-3/?isbn=9781250350862&format=ebook
