He accessed his memory of Eliasz saying “I am not a faggot” for the seven hundred and sixteenth time. “Faggot” was a word for something that only humans cared about. Maybe Eliasz really was like the sprinkler system at Arcata Solar Farm, mistaking Paladin for something he was not.

Finally, Paladin considered the possibility that his own feelings were also an illusion. Every indentured bot knew that there were programs running in his mind that he could not access, nor control– and these programs were designed to inspire loyalty. But were they also supposed to make him care this much about small physiological changes in Eliasz’ body? (128)

Annalee Newitz is no stranger to readers of SF, and she has penned some fine non-fiction. Her first novel, Autonomous, appeared in September 2017 to accolades. We finally get around to reviewing this provocative work, which addresses ownership, patent piracy, indentured servitude, pharmaceutical availability, personal autonomy, and (as in the section quoted above) love, friendship, and sex between natural and artificial beings, who may (both) be at the mercy of their programming.

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Survival, the most recent by Ben Bova, continues his Star Quest series. It’s a contemporary take on a familiar kind of SF, with some grounding in credible science.

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Corey Doctorow’s 2017 novel takes place in a future we can almost touch, and follows the attempts to found a better society—and the forces that impede it. It concerns post-scarcity, climate change, ubiquitous surveillance, revolt against established oligarchies, trans- and post-humanism—and Doctorow has identified it as a kind of prequel to his debut novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom.

One could even imagine these events happening a decade after Little Brother.

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