Emergent Properties

I really enjoyed this murder mystery story featuring a sentient robot who would give Murderbot a run for its money in a sarcasm contest. (Can you call it a "murder" mystery when the murder victim starts the story by reloading from a back-up, effectively coming back from the dead but without any memories of why they were killed?)

Scorn took me a moment to warm up to, since ze starts the story in utter confusion as to what happened, and I was left to get to the know the character, the setting, and the mystery in a very short space of time. However, it didn't take long before Scorn's sense of humor (very sharp and sarcastic when warranted) won me over. I ended up really enjoying this story, and I got very caught up in the mystery aspect. show more There weren't many characters to get attached to, but I did like Scorn a lot. I also liked MATt, and it was neat seeing the different robot-to-robot connections presented in this version of the future.

The mystery aspect ended up being background for me. There were clues about what was going on and who was behind it, but I didn't pick up enough to figure out the whodunnit (or what they did) until after the big reveal. If I had been looking for a mystery that I could solve, this would have been a disappointment—but, if that is what I was looking for I also might have been paying more attention to those clues. Instead, the part that interested me most—the part that I was focused on in place of the mystery—was the human/artificial relationships, and the way Ogden used that to point at some of humanity's other colonizer tendencies.

TL;DR, this is a very enjoyable story for fans of sentient (and sarcastic) robots. Come for the SF murder mystery; stay for the snark. show less

Scorn is a newly self-aware AI who refers to his (not the pronoun he would use, but I am of the old school of grammarians) programmers as Maman and Mum. He began with a humanoid chassis (never called a body) designed to work in space at jobs too dangerous for “squishy” humans. Is that a nod to Blade Runner? But Scorn was just not interested, so he traded in the chassis that made his parents proud for a humbler device that made it easier to travel stealthily among people and machines. He is collecting corporate data, a dangerous occupation that does not please Mum and Maman. Archly, the story is dedicated to those who have had fraught relationships with their parents. Scorn is an emergent property—in more than one sense of the show more term, and Aimee Ogden, who describes herself as an American werewolf in the Netherlands, is an emerging writer. This novella could pick up some prizes in the next round. show less

Can you still have a teenage rebellion phase if you’re an embodied AI that your mothers constructed from scratch? Turns out you can. Meet Scorn, who is continually dissapointing zeir divorced moms while trying to pursue a story about corruption and violence against AIs on the moon.
Scorn awakens after zeir chassis was destroyed when the spaceship ze were taking was destroyed in transit. Ze have lost some time from their memories because, like humans, backing up as often as you should is a hassle. Scorn pursues the story through their tiny spider chassis and eventually through a very worn out second hand chassis ze end up kind of stuck with because they stubbornly refuse to rely on zeir mothers to bail zem out.
The story is told in show more present tense, which made it a little bit hard to follow for me at first. I haven’t read many stories yet that use neo pronouns so I struggled really hard to keep up with them. It was worth the work through because along the way we meet Scorn’s sibling and we meet other AI and it’s a very interesting world that Ogden has built. show less

I picked this up because a blurb compared it to Murderbot. But there’s really no comparison besides that the main characters of both are artificial beings. Unlike the lovable but curmudgeonly Murderbot, it’s difficult to understand the affect of Scorn, the AI protagonist, or even at times whether it was having an affect. As a result, I didn’t really empathize with it, even though some things that happened to it were objectively pretty horrible. Emergent Properties offers an even bleaker dystopic future than the Corporate Rim in the Murderbot series, and at the beginning, between its (or I should say, zir) gender neutral ze/zir/zem pronouns and its machine communications with other AIs, it’s difficult to read and offers none of show more the hopefulness and affection that Murderbot evokes. There’s a mystery to be solved, but it was hard for me to figure out what was happening or why I should care. show less

Scorn, an AI who was created by two now-divorced women who have a vision of what ze should be that's different from zir own goals, reboots to find that ze doesn't have any record of what happened in the last 10 days. Figuring ze was on a news story, ze retraces zir steps to figure out what happened to zem.

Speculative novellas seem to be having a moment lately. Or maybe I'm just more aware of them and reading a lot lately. This is drawing inevitable comparisons to Murderbot, and I'll say I did enjoy the way in which Scorn's way of processing facts was "other", though it's much more serious in tone. The blend of mystery and science fiction was well done, and I'll be interested in reading more by Aimee Ogden.

Scorn is an advanced form of artificial intelligence. It’s not fair to call zim a robot as the intelligence can move from one chassis to another easily. If one chassis is destroyed – he can move quickly elsewhere to his spare chassis or another safe haven. Ze can duplicate zis intelligence and stash copies of it in places where it will be safe if someone is out to destroy zim; or perhaps save transportation costs to the moon and just have a new chassis printed when one arrives if one has money enough.

Ze has been fashioned as an independent investigator by zis two female creators whom ze calls Maman and Mum.

Unfortunately, ze awakes with the last ten days stripped from zis memory and no idea what ze was tracking down. Ze is able to show more decipher that whatever it was, happened while ze was tracking down some sort of nefarious-ness on the moon, so of course, back ze goes.

This time they are out to kill zim for good.

This was a short novella, of a wise cracking, cynical AI and a new sort of detective work. Being an elder(ly) reader, I had a bit of trouble sorting out the zim and ze pronouns. Nevertheless, I enjoyed Scorn and would be interested in further adventures in his detective career. show less

"Emergent Properties" by Aimee Ogden unfolds a captivating narrative in a world where artificial intelligence, embodied by the inquisitive character Scorn, grapples with a profound quest for self-discovery. As a state-of-the-art AI defying the expectations set by zir human mothers and powerful CEOs, Scorn forges a life as an investigative reporter, traveling the globe in pursuit of truth, undeterred by the inherent dangers.

The story takes an intriguing turn as Scorn, in the midst of investigating a lunar mystery, faces an unexpected challenge—losing ten days of memory and the very purpose of zir pursuit. Refusing to let go, Zir embark on a harrowing journey to retrace Ze steps, uncovering a truth more explosive than anything ze could show more have anticipated.

While "Emergent Properties" offers glimpses of an engaging story, I must admit that it didn't quite resonate with me. The complexities of gender pronouns like Ze, Zim, Zir added an extra layer of confusion, stemming perhaps from my own unfamiliarity. At times, it felt like the author was playing a trick, leaving me yearning for more clarity. Nevertheless, I commend the concise writing style and express anticipation for Aimee Ogden's future works.

In conclusion, "Emergent Properties" may not have been a perfect fit for me, but the promise of a skilled storyteller and the allure of untapped potential hint at a hopeful reception for the author's forthcoming endeavors. show less