After briefly veering into full novel territory with 2020’s Network Effect, Martha Wells’ brilliant Murderbot Diaries series returns to its novella-length roots with Fugitive Telemetry, the sixth book in total and the fifth novella in the series. Set (slightly confusingly) between Exit Strategy and Network Effect, it’s essentially a detective story as Murderbot turns investigator in the wake of an unexpectedly dead human turning up on Preservation Station. Concerned that the death might be a sign that GreyCris are attempting to strike at Doctor Mensah, Murderbot begrudgingly agrees to work alongside station security – who seem equally unhappy about the arrangement – to investigate the murder.
The possibility of a GrayCris attack leaves Murderbot as hyper-aware and suspicious as ever regarding the safety of Doctor Mensah, but unfortunately the human security officers aren’t that keen on working with a rogue SecUnit, and Murderbot doesn’t have a particularly high opinion of them in return. There’s no way Murderbot isn’t going to investigate, however, so with Mensah mediating the two parties agree a way forward and get down to the business of finding out who the dead human was, how and why they were murdered (bearing in mind that Preservation Station isn’t exactly known for its murder rate), and whether GrayCris is actually involved or not. The humans don’t have to like Murderbot to make use of its skills, and as Mensah says, getting along with station security might be beneficial to Murderbot’s future prospects as a security consultant.
While familiar characters from the wider series such as Doctor Mensah, Ratthi and Gurathin are present at times (sadly there’s no ART here), this mostly sees Murderbot dealing with a range of new faces from among the humans and bots who live and work on the station. After almost getting used to Mensah and co. treating it with respect, Murderbot now faces up once more to the prejudices of people who don’t really understand what it is but are scared of it regardless. While Murderbot is eminently suited to being a detective – what with all that processing power in its head and all of its technical skills, not to mention its considerable capacity for violence when necessary – it’s interesting to see the humans in station security trying to get their heads around the SecUnit in their presence, much as previous characters did in earlier stories. Of course the tensions this generates make for great reading, and Murderbot’s very human capacity for making mistakes and misunderstanding other people means there’s drama and humour in equal parts.
If Network Effect provided more of everything that’s great about Murderbot but lost just a touch of focus and forward motion, now that we’re back in novella territory there’s no room for anything but the essentials in a stripped-back, tightly-plotted story. There’s nothing wasted here, just relentless pace and momentum coupled with Murderbot’s brilliant voice (both internal and external), full of snark and sarcasm while also (still) totally confused by humans and desperate to tune them out in favour of watching endless repeats of its media. Any Murderbot is great, but the novella length just seems to work best for these stories, delivering perfect chunks of hugely entertaining storytelling, continuing to dig deeper into this unique character and moving the overall series on one episode at a time.
Review copy provided by the publisher: many thanks to Tor.com and Martha Wells for providing me with an advance copy of Fugitive Telemetry, in exchange for my honest review.
See also: all of the other Murderbot Diaries reviews on Track of Words.
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