Book of the Month:
“Sea of Rust” by C. Robert Cargill
A very interesting classic robot-as-overlord story last month with “Humanoids”. Among the most intriguing were the positive edits that were made when the story was gathered from its initial magazine publishing and into a novel. Sure a couple names were changed, but they also trimmed back the ending and took out some questionable and unnecessary “romance” in the final pages. It was a much-needed change and, because of it, I enjoyed the book overall. If you’re considering reading last month’s selection, I recommend the cheap ebook via Amazon.
For this month, we’re back to a contemporary selection. Published in 2017, “Sea of Rust” is a unique approach to the robot novel. From Goodreads,
“It is thirty years since the humans lost their war with the artificial intelligences that were once their slaves. Not one human remains. But as the dust settled from our extinction there was no easy peace between the robots that survived.”
We’ve heard good things from members of Book Club and acclaimed author Joe Hill says, “Sea of Rust is a forty-megaton cruise missile of a novel—it’ll blow you away and lay waste to your heart…” So let’s investigate robotics, personhood, and artificial intelligence from a different angle this month!
