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Book Review of Gridlinked

Gridlinked
Gridlinked
Author: Neal Asher
Genre: Science Fiction & Fantasy
Book Type: Hardcover
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Arian Pelter is a separatist madman who augments his mind with not one, but two network implants or augmentations. Throughout the rest of the novel, Pelters brain is awash in competing streams of data. It drives him further from sanity and the strain manifests itself in physical defects. Reading Neal Ashers GRIDLINKED, I felt like my mind was similarly overloaded and torn apart. Filled with swirling cameos from homicidal golem-androids, babbling intergalactic dragons, malfunctioning teleporters, an ineffective AI government, animal-like cosmetic alterations, an immortal guardian, a self-praised James Bond protagonist, and too many references to Edward Lear poetry, GRIDLINKED was a headache!

While I enjoyed the book in small doses, GRIDLINKED neither came together into a carefully-developed world nor a well-designed novel. The main character was advised early in the book to permanently disable his augmentation so that he could be free of the grid link and be human once again. I recommend the same. Disconnect from this book!