Reviews - Service Model | The StoryGraph

1.81k reviews for:

Service Model

Adrian Tchaikovsky

4.04 AVERAGE

rssulliv's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous emotional funny hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

jrm5394's review against another edition

4.5

adventurous challenging dark hopeful mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Tchaikovsky feels like a man increasingly shouting at society while making his metaphors more obvious and less subtle with each novel and yet no one is listening.

A delightfully bleak combination of murderbot and the road, well worth reading especially in this rapidly expanding and dimming world of AI proliferation.

rasha_reads's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous challenging funny informative reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

If asked for an example of a good science fiction book, “Service Model” will now be one example that comes to mind. This is an oddly quirky and compelling piece of speculative fiction that amuses and inspires in equal measure.

Imagine a robot valet, Charles, who suddenly finds himself unemployed due to the fact that a fault causes him to murder his owner. He then proceeds to wander around a world which has disintegrated…

The book is divided into five parts named, very appropriately after authors and reflecting their style and thoughts (with hidden titles of each section in Leet / robot speak…)

Part 1: KR15-T ➡️ Christie

Part 2: K4FK-R ➡️ Kafka

Part 3: 4-WL ➡️ Orwell

Part 4: 80RH-5 ➡️ Borges

Part 5: D4NT-A ➡️ Dante

As Charles / Uncharles moves forward from one to the next on his journey, he not only explores the world but faces the questions of existence, awareness, sentience and justice. What makes this novel shine is that Charles’ approach is entirely logical leading to some very interesting conclusions and actions in a world that is immaculately imagined and described.

There are a lot of layers in Tchaikovsky’s tale of this C-3PO like robot replete with modern pop culture references as well as literary and philosophical ones so this can be read as a satirical what-if or viewed with an eye towards better understanding the human (robot) condition.

The only reason I did not give this five stars lay in the repetitive nature of the story, at least in the beginning (which was, I admit, probably part of the point the author was trying to make). You have to stick with it - the payoff starts coming through at about the 2/3 mark.

For me, the major takeaway from this book was the robots’ downfall, which, in turn, lay with the illogical nature of following rules, regulations and lists to the exclusion of all other factors. Like the saying goes: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” The whole results in an entertaining read that is also a lesson which should not be ignored.

4.75 stars

@aptshadow

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Content Warnings

ellivdlinde's review against another edition

3.75

adventurous challenging funny hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

For as much as I enjoyed this story I did find myself constantly lost in its setting

bookishbe1's review against another edition

3.5

adventurous dark funny medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

connortapp's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous funny medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

hannahbaird2023's review against another edition

3.75

funny medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

I did enjoy this but I think it went on for a wee bit too long. I wasn't the biggest fan of the execution but the idea is very novel. Interesting choice of words sometimes, you can so tell the author is British, and also chronically online (see "yeeted").