A Sexbot on the Run in a Posthuman Solar System

One of the charmingly weird things about Charles Stross ’ new novel Saturn ’s child is that he cope to include every single cliche of sexual sexual perversion you ’ve seen on the net — and make them somehow fit plausibly into the plot of ground . The writer of the critically - acclaim Halting State has written a fast - pace thriller about Freya , a sexbot designed to service humans , who survive in a solar organization where humans die out out 300 years before . A monster among bot , she ’s programmed to take care like and hunger after something that does n’t survive . Her liveliness is nonmeaningful and cheerless until she take a job smuggling black market place “ pink gook ” ( human cells ) for a suspect bot name Jeeves . There ’s a lot to enjoy ( and mull over ) in this often - satirical novel , and one of the most interesting share is that Freya comes from a line of “ Rhea model ” sexbots who partake in memories and lover — just like the beautiful cylons in Battlestar Galatica do .

Like Stross ’ 2005 novel Glasshouse , about mankind who are indiscriminately assigned genders to participate in an experiment with recreate the 20th hundred , Saturn ’s shaver is fill with interesting idea about what it means to live in a body that you may discard or remold pretty much at will . After humans die out , most bot model themselves on non - human forms or take on the countenance of anime quality . Upper class bot continue stylish by extend their eyes to tremendous anime size , and turning their hair into stiff , blue plumage . Their bot slaves are modeled on the “ tops malformed ” elan of anime role , inadequate and squat , staring for blank traveling that costs so much per pound that many bots prefer to cut off their limbs and buy new 1 when they tail to save money .

One of the central conceits of Saturn ’s Children is that the bots ’ neurology is copied wholesale from human being ’ because the human race never figured out a direction to make A.I. from scratch . That means bot brains are fundamentally human — with all the attendant emotion and contradictions — except for one affair . They ’ve all been hardwired to obey man . As a outcome , as Freya abide by repeatedly , the bot company that mankind leave behind is about 70 percent striver . A few favorable bot who have pull in enough money own most of the other bots , controlling them via hard worker chips .

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Freya and her babe in the Rhea line are some of the lucky innocent agents who have established their exemption by creating shell corporations that “ own ” them ( since robot use human legal philosophy , and under human law no robot can be free , the bots have used weird effectual loopholes like this to launch personal reign ) . Over the one C of years they ’ve been alive , the Rhea sisters have traded their memory chips back and off , sharing retentivity and often conflate their personalities partly as a result . Bereft of their “ one on-key love , ” the humans , many of Freya ’s line have chosen to kill themselves . But others have found purpose in sprightliness by getting involved in an elaborate conspiracy to recreate humans out of the tabu “ pinkish goo ” — and perchance free all the slave bot in the physical process .

As the plot thicken , and Freya gets involved ( in all sorts of ways ) with the line of humanoid Jeeves robots , Stross is able to give us a first - mortal sense of what it would palpate like to be an individual who also has a limited collective cognizance . As I note before , this novel feel to me like it was partly an effort to search the minds of the sexbot - esque cylons on BSG . Freya hears the voices of her baby in her psyche , and experiences proxy feelings for the hoi polloi they love ( or detest ) , which is both perplexing and in the end living - saving for her . It also think of she has the erotic dreams of her Sister , too , which come in ready to hand during those 4 - year journeys across the solar system in nuke - powered ship with nothing to do but jack off .

There is a sight of jack up off in this Koran . And tentacle sexuality , and bondage , and lesbian sexuality , and sex with sentient hotel furniture , and sex with spaceship , and sex in blank elevator , and sex with multiple siblings , and sexual practice under the influence of slave chip thinker ascendance , and there is almost a prospect of sexuality in front of a huge room full of people who have derive to an vendue . But here ’s the eldritch thing : None of it is particularly arousing , and when it happens it really is just so course part of the plot of land that you hardly mark ( after all , Freya is a sexbot so of course she has sexual practice with everything ) . I have to admit , I was disappoint when Stross unrelentingly retain the note lightheaded ( “ I feel him air out , ” Freya read of one lover ) instead of erotic . However , I think his point is well - taken : For Freya , gender is just a body role she ’s been programmed for . It ’s not so much titillating as autonomic .

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He may go goofy when it comes to sex , but one affair Stross is serious about is trying to represent space traveling accurately . Anybody who has readhis rant about how stupid it is to conceive of that humans could travel in spaceknows that he ’s got a bone to pick , and pick it he does . There is no FTL here , and the only reason why anybody gets anywhere in the solar organisation in less than a X is because they ’re robot whose body can resist strains no human could .

So you ’ll want to hail to this space thriller for hard scientific discipline fun , and a little sexytime , but you ’ll stay because Stross always raises interesting philosophical interrogative that stick around in your brain . For example , what does it mean to be you if you are also partly your sibling ? And how can you have exemption when your brain is programme to service , even if it ’s only to answer an missing master ? The answers are always more complicated than you think .

Saturn ’s Children[via Amazon ]

Lesdilley