The Robots of Gotham

Starred review from April 9, 2018
ebut author McAulty, an expert in machine language learning, extrapolates a scary AI-overrun 2083 that’s only a few steps removed from today’s reality. This massive and impressive novel is set in an America that outlawed the development of artificial intelligence and quickly lost a short and bitter war against robot-led fascist countries. Most of America is now occupied by Venezuelan “peacekeeping” forces. The story is narrated tastefully and with self-deprecating humor by Barry Simcoe, a 30-something Canadian CEO recently arrived in Chicago to close some international technology deals. Shocked by what he sees, he immediately plunges into 10 days of complicated rescue sorties against a backdrop of urban devastation and corruption. He saves a wounded diplomat robot, allies himself with a Russian biowarfare specialist who’s developing an antidote for a virus intended to wipe out the human race, and risks his life to adopt a starving Rottweiler. For romantic appeal, he variously saves and is saved by Mackenzie Stronnick, a gorgeous machine-hating Chicago realtor; tough Venezuelan sergeant Noa Van de Velde; and enigmatic masked robot Jacaranda. Though the technology-rich plot loses a bit of its savage verisimilitude as it progresses, McAulty maintains breathless momentum throughout. Readers will hope for more tales of this sinister future and eagerly pick up on hints that Barry and his companions may continue their exploits.

This fantastical audiobook features an everyman who stumbles onto a labyrinthian conspiracy. Narrator Graham Winton smoothly inhabits Canadian Barry Simcoe, who has grown up in a world in which humans are subjugated by robot rulers. The wise-ass yet cunning Simcoe starts out as an innocent who gets caught up in a rebel attack during a business trip to Chicago. He soon hooks up with a badly injured robot and a stoic Russian medic, and together they discover a plague engineered by machines to kill humans. Winton is up to the challenge of creating a large cast of characters with accents ranging from Russian to Spanish and whatever it is that robots speak. The result is a complex and fascinating thriller as Simcoe and his allies race to save humankind from its equally diabolical successor. D.E.M. � AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine