Review: The Six

The Six by Mark Alpert
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Recommended quite nicely by the likes of R.L. Stine and Michael Grant, this here book is a cool look into AI and robotics and the sort of thing that, whenever it appears in the movies, tends to get crapped on (think Transcendence or Chappie). Our titular Six may have damaged human bodies, but as robots, they can be something more...and something more is exactly what we might need when an AI inevitably goes rogue and starts doing the whole "Skynet just became self-aware" thing.

Sure, there's a lot of stuff we've seen before, but also a lot of stuff we haven't. And, even better, it's an all-ages kind of adventure - a little like the recent Goosebumps movie, or Guillermo Del Toro's collaboration with Daniel Kraus on Trollhunters, but sci-fi as opposed to horror. YA-age protagonists in a book that could also be easily marketed as MG. That sort of thing. It works just as well here too, especially for anyone who is now, or has ever been, a geek. Just the thought of Adam using Darth Vader-shaped speakers to blast Kanye West at maximum volume (and on the subject of Kanye, I'm now pretty mad because his "Ultralight Beam" is almost identical in name to an "ultralight bomb" featured in my own writing, which means I'll likely have to change the name to avoid copyright infringement or something. Or else I'll just make a joke out of it - like, "Yeah, we named it before Kanye's song came along, I swear." So that part, based on timing alone, made me laugh a little more than it should have.)

I have the sneaking suspicion that there'll be a sequel to this book, and if so, I'll be eagerly awaiting it for a while.

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