Kage Baker resumes her story of the immortals who work for the mysterious Dr. Zeus, Inc. with this seventh book (not counting chapbooks and shorter works that have appeared as well) and brings us close to the climax, but not all the way there. The end is nigh, though, as The Sons of Heaven, the finale, is due within the month.
The Machine’s Child is mainly concerned with Alec Checkerfield, the 24th century cyber-pirate, his doppelgangers Nicholas Harpole and Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax, the immortal Mendoza (who loved and is loved by all three men) and Alec’s AI protector Captain Morgan, with smaller mix-ins following Executive Facilitator Joseph (Mendoza’s ‘father’) and a few other high-level Company staff. Plus several odd, almost unnecessary passages introducing a mortal named David, the sole employee manning a storage facility as deep in the past as the Company can manage.
I enjoyed this novel: the characters kept moving and Baker was very creative in inserting them into historical shadows, keeping to her rule that history cannot be changed but activity that hasn’t been recorded can still occur (in the past, that is) and bringing those past times to life. The movement isn’t for action’s sake alone but to usefully advance the plot/story arc and deepen the characterizations. She could have left most of the bits with David out and the portion at the end with Sarai and Suleyman was a mite out of left field, but these are relatively minor quibbles as I was very happy to see the concluding novel will be out ASAP.
recommended
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