Book Review: Charles Stross Saturn's Children

I have been planning to read Charles Stross for some time; ever since being told that he includes interesting economics in his novels. Saturn's Children is not supposed to be the best example of this (see this list of SFF books that are supposed to use economics well), but it is the first book in a universe that includes Neptune's Brood which is supposed to better.

The novel follows Freya Nakamichi-47, an android living in a distant future in which humanity is extinct and an almost feudal society of androids and robots has colonized our Solar System. Freya is free from vassalage but, having been designed as a sex-bot, is obsolete and must work menial jobs.

You might think that a book populated by robots and androids would become a bit sterile. To combat this, one of the central conceits of Saturn's Children is that the robot/android neurology is copied from humans' because the humans never figured out how to do it any other way. Thus all of the robots/androids have human personalities allowing the reader to identify with them.

Economics makes an appearance through Stross's study of the costs of interplanetary travel (they are large). When Freya is forced to flee Venus, it comes at the price of accepting a job as a courier for the mysterious Jeeves Corporation ferrying "pink goo" (code for replicating living tissue). In the process, she becomes embroiled in a complex war among factions conspiring against each other for control of society. Among the factions are several of Freya's "sibs"—androids of the same design with similar initial conditioning—with whom Freya can swap "soul chips" and thus adopt aspects of their history and personalities.

Along the way, Stross examines a number of interesting philosophical questions. For example, how much free will does Freya possess given that she was programmed to serve humanity but humanity is extinct? Should Freya be able to give up her free will—through a slave chip—by accepting vassalage? And how much free will do any of us have, when the rich can act to narrow the set of opportunities we face until vassalage seems like the only option?

There is also a lot of sex in the novel. This is perhaps to be expected given that the viewpoint character is a sex-bot. To Freya, phalluses (phalli?) and vaginas are everywhere: buildings look like dildos. And she has been programmed to enjoy sex. A lot. And to crave it.

On the whole, I thought this was a well done piece of fiction. Although the plot meanders and let me down at times (the middle third drags a bit), the depiction of the world, and the philosophical questions the books raised, kept me interested throughout. On my rating scale, that makes it a "good" ...

R⁴ Rating: 7 out of 10.