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The Departure (Owner Trilogy 1)
by Neal Asher (Author)
The Argus Space Station looks down on a nightmarish Earth. And from this safe distance, the Committee enforces its despotic rule. There are too many people and too few resources, and they need twelve billion to die before Earth can be stabilised. So corruption is rife, people starve, and the poor are policed by mechanised overseers and identity-reader guns. Citizens already fear the brutal Inspectorate with its pain inducers. But to reach its goals, the Committee will unleash satellite laser weaponry, taking carnage to a new level.
This is the world Alan Saul wakes to, travelling in a crate destined for the Calais incinerator. How he got there he doesn't know, but he remembers pain and his tormentor's face. He also has company: Janus, a rogue intelligence inhabiting forbidden hardware in his skull. As Janus shows Saul an Earth stripped of hope, he resolves to annihilate the Committee and their regime. Once he's discovered who he was, and killed his interrogator.
The Departure marks Asher's most recent venture away from his polity novels. It also happens to be one of his most concise and focused narrative story's to date. The story follows Alan Saul on his mission for vengeance in a totalitarian regime world.
The setting feels very distinctly 1984 inspired and feels seriously believable and engrossing. Unlike most of Asher's previous books this novel essentially is centred on two main characters. The violence is as ultra as ever, his world building as grand and down to earth and he never seems to run out of ideas. The main character is essentially a remorseless sociopath, but that's the whole idea, he is ruthless and resourceful and someone you would never want to **** off, but he is actually a lot deeper.
Asher has managed to envisage a very believable world with some cleverly designed monstrosity's such as "adjustment" and the committee itself. It puts forward some intriguing moral dilemmas such as what would you really do when the world population has reached 18 billion!
I enjoyed the book enough to want to read the other two books in the series.
Given the recent spate of scifi movies, I wouldn't be surprised if this was made into a film in the near future.
by Neal Asher (Author)
The Argus Space Station looks down on a nightmarish Earth. And from this safe distance, the Committee enforces its despotic rule. There are too many people and too few resources, and they need twelve billion to die before Earth can be stabilised. So corruption is rife, people starve, and the poor are policed by mechanised overseers and identity-reader guns. Citizens already fear the brutal Inspectorate with its pain inducers. But to reach its goals, the Committee will unleash satellite laser weaponry, taking carnage to a new level.
This is the world Alan Saul wakes to, travelling in a crate destined for the Calais incinerator. How he got there he doesn't know, but he remembers pain and his tormentor's face. He also has company: Janus, a rogue intelligence inhabiting forbidden hardware in his skull. As Janus shows Saul an Earth stripped of hope, he resolves to annihilate the Committee and their regime. Once he's discovered who he was, and killed his interrogator.
The Departure marks Asher's most recent venture away from his polity novels. It also happens to be one of his most concise and focused narrative story's to date. The story follows Alan Saul on his mission for vengeance in a totalitarian regime world.
The setting feels very distinctly 1984 inspired and feels seriously believable and engrossing. Unlike most of Asher's previous books this novel essentially is centred on two main characters. The violence is as ultra as ever, his world building as grand and down to earth and he never seems to run out of ideas. The main character is essentially a remorseless sociopath, but that's the whole idea, he is ruthless and resourceful and someone you would never want to **** off, but he is actually a lot deeper.
Asher has managed to envisage a very believable world with some cleverly designed monstrosity's such as "adjustment" and the committee itself. It puts forward some intriguing moral dilemmas such as what would you really do when the world population has reached 18 billion!
I enjoyed the book enough to want to read the other two books in the series.
Given the recent spate of scifi movies, I wouldn't be surprised if this was made into a film in the near future.
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