Horror Book Reviews
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Title: Brass Man |
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Review of Brass Man
- From the Philip K. Dick Award nominee author of Cowl, an adrenaline-powered new SF adventure: Brass Man. Neal Asher returns to his trademark Polity future setting, in a sequel to Gridlinked, which SFRevu.com called "brilliant and audacious work, chock-full of cutting-edge ideas."Ian Cormac, a legendary Earth Central Security agent, the James Bond of a wealthy future, is hunting an interstellar dragon, little knowing that, far away, his competition has resurrected an horrific killing machine named "Mr. Crane" to assist in a similar hunt, ecompassing whole star systems. Mr. Crane, the insane indestructible artificial man now in a new metal body, seeks to escape a bloody past he can neither forget nor truly remember. And he is on a collision course with Ian Cormac.
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Comments for Brass Man
- Posted on 2008-04-03
Brass Man
Brilliant! The fantastic murderous android from "Gridlinked" returns amidst shadows of mystery and splashes of blood. Asher is as on form as ever with his to-the-point, indomitable style as he resurrects the fan favourite.
Thankfully this isn't just a piece of mindless action for the fans, like many cash-in sequels. It is a well thought out thriller constructed around the resurgence of an ancient technology, a feature of Asher's Polity world that has been hinted at earlier in the series. Here we see a step away from technological threats toward organic threats, and interesting change in direction for the series that keeps things fresh. The characters have yet to become stale after three novels, particularly the dracomen and the massive, Delphic entity Dragon itself.
Frustratingly, the most mysterious character of the series remains a flat non-entity; Horace Blegg, who is deliberately kept as an enigma, features more as an annoyance now than an intriguing sub-plot. Presumably Asher caught on to this as the fourth book "Polity Agent" finally provides us with some answers to this flagging mystery. Similarly there are problems with additional characters added to the mix, such as the "knight" who is searching for his figurative dragon, who ultimately has little impact on the story. No doubt Asher will tie up this loose end in later novels, but it remains neglected entirely from the fourth book and the character seemed to have little, if nothing at all to do with the overall storyline.
These are small issues though, and the overall enjoyment of the book is left mostly unspoiled. Overall it's another wonderful and entertaining deep-space yarn that had me at least ordering the sequel before I'd even finished it ... 3.5 stars, but since I'm not allowed half measures I'll bump it up to a respectible 4!
Score: 4
- Posted on 2008-02-10
Super Reader
Super agent vs super criminal, again.
When you do the super secret agent in space type of story, it is generally important to have more of a personal focus on your hero. This book, at least in this incarnation is around 500 pages long, and a lot of the middle is taken up with other threads, that while tangentially interesting are nowhere near as good as the parts featuring Cormac and his directly related allies themselves.
This includes the locals on the planet, the dragon slayer quest, etc.
The part that does work as well as that is when the viewpoint steps back even further, to the conflict between the various AI entities, and hints at their plans and goals, sort of a cross between Culture Mind ships and the Technocore in Hyperion, to a certain extent.
Asher could have chopped a chunk of this out and made it a better book for keeping the reader's interest -the dragon hunter story may well have made a good stand alone novella.
Editorial demands to be this length? Who knows, but the middle of the book was certainly tedious, at times.
The same cannot be said for the start and the end, which were definite improvements.
Padding is not a virute in this sort of bloody superhero space opera, in general.
The title character, referring to the android Mr. Crane, is again not much of a feature, except for a mysterious revelation near the end - which presumably might leave him starring in his own story, later on.
3.5 out of 5
Score: 4 - Posted on 2007-11-02
More excellent Asher
I'm now on Polity Agent, having read the first three books in the Ian Cormac series. Brass Man is the third (of four) books in the series, and another excellent addition. Reviving Mr Crane, the psychotic Golem from Gridlinked, Asher pits bad guys with nano-infused, alien technology against our series heroes in the usual hostile environment of leviathan monsters and AI-led ships racing through u-space overhead. Enjoyable for its dense plotting, imaginative flora & fauna, and action. I've mentally screened it as the last Bond melded with the first Star Wars, throttled up to Tarantino ultraviolence levels.
Score: 5
- Posted on 2007-08-13
I read this one first
At times it was slow going because characters fleshed out in previous novels of the series are introduced here with no explanation. However, I thought it was an excellent sci fi read, up there with novels like Starship Troopers, Ender's Game, Forever War, et. all. Tons of stuff going on, great prose style, very cool characters and engrossing good v evil plot. Highly recomended.
Score: 5 - Posted on 2007-03-27
at last, fantastically applied science of fiction
+1 for bone-crunching non-stop airport loung action
+1 for sizzling wit - especially the Cervantes characters
+1 for total mastery of his plot-line and weaving it all together
+1 for bettering Ian M Banks, Peter F Hamilton and Alastair Reynolds
-1 to the publisher for NOT making clear on sleeve this was #3 in series
Bottom line: best thing to happen to Brit SciFi in light years! B
Score: 4
