Service Model

Wildly uneven and unusual book from Tchaikovsky. On the balance I liked it, mostly because I developed such sympathy for the protagonist. But parts were rough going.

The opening part of the book is very funny with a writing conceit about the mechanistic "thinking" of AIs. I liked it for one chapter and then it kept going and I was fearing it'd be a whole book like that. Ugh! Fortunately once the point is thoroughly made Tchaikovsky goes on to other writing styles. It's all a bit meta and too clever in places but overall it's fine.

What's weird is this is Tchaikovsky writing a light, conversational book. I tend to think of his harder sci-fi stuff. Here this book about a robot is quite humanistic and intimate. It works. Other things didn't work for me, particularly the human character The Wonk. She felt unnecessary and badly drawn to me, I am curious if this book could have been made to work without her entirely.

Also unconvinced about the ambitions of comparing itself to Dante's Inferno. Or the grand design of the whole story. It's a big, wide ranging story and it doesn't always get to his ambitious narrative goals. But overall it held together and I'm glad I read it.