Shadow of the Scorpion

Asher, Neal. Shadow of the Scorpion. Polity Universe No. 2 (Chronological). Tor, 2008.
Here’s how I think it must have gone down. Neal Asher is reading Ian M. Banks’s Culture series in the 1990s and thinks, “That’s cool. I bet I could one-up that.” And maybe he did. In Asher’s Polity Universe there are more AIs in more kinds of machines, more humans, posthumans and aliens, more strange locales, badass beasts, selfish-gene viruses, and more biotech of all kinds. As of April 2020, the series has grown to 17 novels in several different subseries. By 2008, Asher concluded that the Agent Cormac series needed a prequel—Shadow of the Scorpion—that delves into the childhood of Earth Central Security’s super soldier, Agent Ian show more Cormac (the name has to be an homage). He finds that, because he was traumatized by war as a child, his memories were selectively deleted. It is a neat treatment for post-traumatic stress if you can make it work. But is it a good idea? If you want the trauma back, can the memories be retrieved? How should you feel about the people who did the editing? Which way has more survival value? Eventually, Cormac will have to find out. show less

I found this on the bookshelf in the lounge at Curry Village in Yosemite. I like science fiction war stories and this pleasantly whiled away the time when I wanted to read in beautiful surroundings and before I went to sleep at night. It’s the origin story of a soldier named Cormac who is obviously destined for greatness. He fights the enemy, deals with betrayals and injuries, and learns some things about his past. I don’t know who the audience is for the bits about how his penis was like a rod of iron when he was having sex with the beautiful chameleon-soldier, but I was not that audience (aside from the lolz.) Overall interesting and well-written, but I don’t feel called to read the many other novels in this series.

This one is easily a better novel than the previous one, but I can't quite tell if that's just because the heavy lifting of the tech and aliens has already been long-established from within [b:Prador Moon|1060548|Prador Moon (Polity Universe, #1)|Neal Asher|https://d2arxad8u2l0g7.cloudfront.net/books/1388251982s/1060548.jpg|2175639].

This one moves well beyond a straight high-tech military porn and delves into the creation of Ian Cormac, of whom later novels are focused, and the reveals he slowly learns about his erased childhood, splitting the novel between his adulthood and his formation pretty equally, while also being embroiled in a techno-political thriller years after the main wars have already been waged.

Human separatists are show more still an issue, of course, as are the Prador.

More interestingly, for me, is the introduction of the new places and the titles of later books and a hint of their importance for later. It's these things that hook me and make me a fan. A good novel is still a good novel, with a full beginning, middle, and end, but without these juicy tidbits of a far-off adventure, I might have stopped here.

I'm not stopping, suffice to say. :)

I'm really getting into this now. It's no longer a fun and fast-paced pew pew popcorn, but a serious character tale, too. :) Yay! show less

If you've read any of Neal Asher's fiction to date you know what you're going to find here; grim, violent action in a space-opera environment that is thematically post-human. Over and above that you get Asher's take on what the psychological impact of a long and desperate war with a non-human foe might be like, via the family experiences of his perennial character Ian Cormac. There is the additional virtue that this book makes a good introduction to Asher's universe.

Sometimes being the omniscient reader can be a bit of a pain. Especially when the author telegraphs the ending so early in the book. By then end you just want to smack our hero. All of the horror has dissipated. Save some surprises for us. I thought the technology was handled very well, which can be a problem in this genre. Very creative.

This is sort of a prequel – we follow Ian Cormac, ECS special agent from his young days to his enlistment with military and later to the special operations unit called Sparkind. Parallel to this, another storyline unfolds – story holding the key to the very disturbing event that took place when Ian was young, event that may even explain why he is followed by a military grade autonomous scorpion-like drone unit.

Fast paced, very interesting – bears great resemblance to Iain M Banks Culture series but is much more action oriented (maybe closest series to this one are Takeshi Kovacs novels).

Got me hooked up and looking for more books with the same main character.

Recommended.

sigh. bit hard to rate, maybe 3 and a quarter stars.. sort of a prequel to the Agent Cormac series. which is basically pulp sf and written accordingly. Cormac never gets what Amistad comes so far to tell him: he doesn't want to know. on some level the book is less about intergalactic war and more about memory, and the consequences of being able to, and so electing to, forget. so, in the context of the larger Polity Universe, not so unimportant. but as a standalone, a throwaway.