Kill Decision
By Daniel Suarez
(Dutton)
The most interesting characters in Daniel Suarez’s new techno-thriller, “Kill Decision,” are a trained pair of ravens who hover over the good guys as guardian angels.
That’s unfortunate.
There are a lot of big ideas in this novel, which warns against a future where machines make even the ultimate decision ― to kill ― without human intervention.
And I’m sure Suarez’s book will find many fans among tech heads and futurists. But his audience would be much larger, and his ideas would have even more impact, if his human characters acted less like programmed machines and more like real people.
In the end, I cared more about the birds.
Suarez, a software specialist turned novelist, is a phenomenon. He self-published his first novel, “Daemon,” in 2006, under the pen name Leinad Zeraus, his name spelled backward.
Not exactly Mark Twain, but nice effort.
In “Daemon,” as Suarez himself summarizes, bots scan the Internet looking for the obituary of their designer. When they find it, they start to dismantle society.
“Daemon” has been compared to William Gibson’s 1984 novel, “Neuromancer,” because both look at technology’s impact on society in fresh ways. True. Watch a video of Suarez’s talk at the Long Now Foundation about bot-moderated reality and you’ll never look at your laptop the same.
Gibson, though, has a much more deft touch with his characters. As technology runs amok, they still seem human.
It’s not that Suarez doesn’t try. His hero in “Kill Decision” is an orphan, David Shaw, code-named Odin, the Norse god and father of Thor. The ravens, Huginn and Muninn, are Odin’s messengers.
But while Huginn and Muninn reveal more and more of their personalities over the course of the book, Odin/Shaw never develops beyond the level of video game hero.
A pity. Maybe Odin’s character will emerge more fully in the sequel.
And that’s another problem with “Kill Decision.” It has a completely unsatisfying ending. Suarez seems more intent on preserving secrets so readers will buy his next book. For now, we have no idea who is really behind the killing drones terrorizing America.
The book ends with the cawing of the ravens as they watch over the humans far below.
Compare that to George R.R. Martin’s ending to the first installment of his multi-book “Game of Thrones” series: The mother of dragons, naked and holding three baby firebreathers, walks out of the still smoldering ashes of what should have been her cremation. After such a revelation, readers can’t get to the next book ― or HBO season ― fast enough.
I’ll pass on the sequel to “Kill Decision.” (MCT)
