Rating: ★★★
I thoroughly enjoyed the first book of The Murderbot Diaries, so I decided to immediately continue with the second book, Artificial Condition. I have to admit that I was slightly disappointed. This review will be shorter for a couple reasons: it’s a short book, and it’s a sequel. I don’t want to spoil the first book.
We continue to follow the narrator, a “murderbot.” In this book, they give themself the name of Eden and they’re trying to pass as an augmented human rather than just a murderbot. I won’t explain how or why they got there.
The events of the book are rather slow, and virtually no action happens until the last few pages. Because of that, it felt like a real filler episode. Eden has to get from the end of book one to wherever they’re going next once they do this one specific thing. That one specific thing is the goal of this book, but of course a few things get in the way. Once that thing is accomplished, and it takes about 150 pages to dance around it getting accomplished, the book has to end.
I guess you could see the goal, the reveal of certain information, was very important, and I could see why a whole book would focus on it. But overall, it just felt like a set-up between plot points. I have no idea what’s going to happen in book three, Rogue Protocol, but it seems Eden had to do this thing in order for those events to happen. I don’t see why Artificial Condition couldn’t be tightened up and possibly combined with book three.
With that said, I obviously finished the book and wanted to see what would happen. I like our main character. I like how they think and act. I like the humor of the book. I was happy to follow Eden along. I’m not really one to ask for lots of action, but it really felt like nothing was happening except filler.
I will continue the series, but not just yet. I’m going to pick a different book to read next.