Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2003 in Books
• Published on: 2002-03-08
• Binding: Paperback
• 528 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Gridlinked is the talented Neal Asher's first full-length SF novel, an accomplished rapid-action thriller crammed with high technology, obsessed characters, and the glittering boys' toys of advanced weaponry.

Cormac is a legendary Earth Central Security agent, the James Bond of a wealthy future where "runcible" transmitters allow interstellar travel in an eye blink. Unfortunately Cormac is nearly burnt out, "gridlinked" to the AI net so long that his humanity has drained away. He has to take the cold turkey cure and shake his addiction to instant online access, even while investigating the unique runcible disaster that's wiped out the entire human colony on planet Samarkand in a 30 megaton explosion ...

Hot on Cormac's heels is vengeful terrorist Pelter, backed up by his unstoppable, psychotic android killer "Mr Crane" and a goon squad of mercenaries. Other trouble has been brewing since 27 years earlier, when Cormac was humanity's ambassador to a vast, incomprehensible alien that called itself Dragon. Deep beneath Samarkand's surface there are buried mysteries, fiercely guarded. And is it true that Cormac's enigmatic boss is an immortal who's lived half a millennium and was born in the 20th century?

Asher's galaxy is full of colour and sleaze, and his story rattles along at speed. There are surprises, double-crosses, elaborate lies to be seen through, astonishing escapes from certain death, and last-minute reversals. Though the ultimate fates of the lesser villains seem mildly anticlimactic, the true bad guy is dealt with in spectacular style. Sequels are hinted. Fast-moving, edge-of-the-seat entertainment. --David Langford

Synopsis
In outer space you can never feel sure that your adversary is altogether human. The runcible buffers on Samarkand have been mysteriously sabotaged, killing many thousands and destroying a terraforming project. Agent Cormac must reach it by ship to begin an investigation. But Cormac has incurred the wrath of a vicious psychopath called Pelter, who is prepared to follow him across the galaxy with a terrifying android in tow. Despite the sub-zero temperature of Samarkand, Cormac discovers signs of life: they are two 'dracomen', alien beasts contrived by an extra-galactic entity calling itself 'Dragon', which is a huge creature consisting of four conjoined spheres of flesh each a kilometre in diameter. Caught between the byzantine wiles of the Dragon and the lethal fury of Pelter, Cormac needs to skip very nimbly indeed to rescue the Samarkand project and protect his own life.

Customer Reviews

Cracking Read
Being a varied reader I try lots of genres. Of late Peter Hamilton has gripped me with his astounding story telling and I thought I would risk ASHER to see how different another epic space story could be told. There will always be similarities but what a good read. New ideas and characters. As the obvious first book in a set it takes a while to get to grips with the tech and general way the world works but by the end I'm hooked and have blasted through the others which are equally as good.

Cyber-punk meets Iain Banks in this great piece of sci-fi
This is an action-packed story but with some very clever cyber-punk concepts as well. There's also a big Iain Banks influence, but what's wrong with that! The story is generally well paced, there are a few lulls but when things get going, they really get going. One of the most enigmatic and scariest characters in this is the robot Mr Crane, not someone/something you want to meet on a dark night and superbly conceptualised by Asher, a must book for sci-fi fans.

gridlinked
Neal Asher is one of those authors who manages to deliver something that is fast-paced and engaging without feeling like something you wish you'd borrowed from the library instead of buying. To be honest he borders on pulp at time, but in this case it's not a bad thing - "Gridlinked" is a great example of how he counterbalances the pulp factor with comprehensible science and surprising clarity at times, forgoing the fancy narrative and pseudo-poetry that a lot of science-fiction authors go for.

He is concise and compelling for the most part - the downside is that the characters feel like film characters rather than real people, but when you're after this kind of action sci-fi, that is weird and wonderful stories filled with awesome gadgets and creatures, it doesn't matter too much. "Gridlinked" is one of the Agent Cormac novels to feature the brilliant Mr Crane, a bronze android with fearsome strength and almost tangibly intimidating personality. One of the most original characters I've read in sci-fi, he's the character who causes you to tut when his scene ends and grin when his next one begins. Cormac is almost as engaging, a man dehumanised by his integration with technology and his intellectual proximity to the many AIs that govern Earth and other colonised worlds.

It's a fine novel and well worth a read, especially if you haven't read Asher before and want to branch out into new authors.