Chimera: An Isaac Asimov Robot Mystery by Mark W. Tiedmann (EPUB)

Description

Coren Lanra, head of security for DyNan Manual Industries, investigates the murder of the daughter of DyNan’s president Rega Looms during an ill-fated smuggling operation, and uncovers links to the past.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Coren Landra is a private security boss investigating baley-running (Earth citizens illegally attempting to emigrate to Spacer worlds). When he discovers that a group of baleys he’s been tracking has wound up dead in transit from Earth to Kopurnik space station, things become personal, as one of the victims, Nyom Looms, is his ex-girlfriend, and the daughter of his boss, an anti-spacer industry leader running for political office. The only evidence Coren initially has to work with is a robot in positronic lock with blood on it’s hands. His investigations will take him on a twisting path as he discovers politicians maneuvering behind the scenes, greed and depravity withing the leadership of massive corporations and even a hint that a spacer world may be trying to start a war. Chimera also introduces us to cyborgs – not wholly human or robot.Let me say for the record that Chimera has an interesting plot and fits relatively well into the universe created by Isaac Asimov. It introduces new concepts (Cyborgs) and continues to give us a look at the relationship between Earth and the Spacer worlds, especially the links between Earth, Aurora and Solaria. Sometimes relationships and characters from the Spacer worlds strain the boundaries created by Asimov, but otherwise Tiedemann keeps things relatively close to what Asimov created, while adding some freshness and depth to the universe. Several of the point-of-view characters return in Chimera, including Auroran ambassador Arile Burgess and Derec, the positronics specialist, and I found them, along with Coren Landra, to be interesting, compelling protagonists.Where Chimera fails is, in part, what made Asimov so successful. While Asimov needed only a handful of characters and organizations to write a deep, complex mystery, Tiedmann goes the opposite route, giving us dozens of persons, organizations (both political and industrial) and links between them. I don’t read a lot of mystery books in general, but I don’t know how anyone who’s not writing down all these links and characters in a notebook possibly keeps track! There are literally points in the novel where we’re given page long lists of characters and their stock and investment dealings linking them to other individuals and companies, when they divested of those stocks, who bought them afterwards and on and on to the point where I had no hope of following the twists and turns and just found myself waiting for the end and for someone to – please – give me a wrap up. Which sort of happens, kinda.In comparing Asimov to Tiedemann, I find myself thinking that when I read an Asimov book, I don’t want it to end…I want more! When I’m reading a Tiedemann novel set in Asimov’s world, I can’t wait for the end, just to have someone summarize what the heck I just read.

⭐Tiedemann recently resurfaced with this, his second attempt at new robot mysteries. And again, he’s done an impressive job.Asimov’s original robot novels were generally straightforward. While not predictable by any stretch of the imagination, the mysteries themselves were fairly simple. Tiedemann has taken Asimov’s “universe” but made the mysteries more complex and expanded the scope of the setting to fully explain political situations, alliances, development of society in settler and spacer worlds…many of the things Asimov himself never fully developed. This all amounts to a fairly complex mystery novel set in Asimov’s vision of the future.The novel is not without problems. One criticism I had of Tiedemann’s first novel still holds true – two of the main characters have an extensive past together yet Tiedemann makes no mention of this fact. Some of the ideas in Chimera also come across as a bit far-fetched in the context of the setting that Asimov established.All-in-all, Chimera is an entertaining read. If you’re a fan of Asimov’s original robot novels, its definitely worth picking up. If you’ve not had exposure to the originals, however, start with them.

⭐I really can’t read this book. The text does not flow like Asimov’s books. It reads like something else. It is a littlke too fast paced, with too little dialogue and I think there is not enough reflection on the background and the possibilities.The basic premise has got something wrong with it. It’s not tied in too well to other things.If Asimov would use any of these ideas,he would offer some explanation. Asimov also, by the way,often had some short third person narration interspersed inhis books and this is totally missing.Robert Silverberg expanded a few Isaac Asimov stories into books and he did it in keeping with Asimov’s style. Robert Tiedemann is no Robert Silverberg. If Asimov had been alive, I don’t thinmk he would have approved of this, except if he decided not to careI give it two stars because at least this is a try. Also, I only have this book,not its predecessor.

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