Altered Carbon

Locations
Call Number: Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / Morgan, Richard K.
On Shelf At: Traverwood Branch

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Traverwood Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / Morgan, Richard K.	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / Morgan, Richard K.	4-week checkout	Due 05-12-2024

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COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Scifi detective noir submitted by eknapp on December 6, 2011, 2:48pm 500 years in the future, people are functionally just software, uploaded and downloaded into new "sleeves" (bodies) at will. Dead? New sleeve (if you can afford it; it's like buying a house). Business trip? Have yourself broadcast into a clone or synthetic body on the other side of the country, or world, or galaxy.

Altered Carbon is about a mercenary hired by a 300 year old rich guy to investigate his own murder, which the police insist was a suicide. It's an interesting blend of science fiction and detective noir. It has a grungy techno feel, sort of like the Blade Runner movie. There's intrigue, kidnappings, official corruption, gunfights, even a couple of femme fatales.

Morgan takes full advantage of his hypothetical technologies to play around with questions of identity. How much of a person is defined by the body he wears? If you copy yourself into another sleeve, at what point are you no longer really the same person? Right away? Never, since your two copies shared 100% of their formative experiences? It's fascinating, and the philosophical questions somehow don't slow down the well-written action sequences. Possibly the best book I've read in the last couple years.

Weird concept... submitted by tbbrown76 on July 13, 2014, 12:49pm sort of immortality.

Slow moving submitted by SurfGrape on June 16, 2017, 3:21pm As a huge cyberpunk and noir fan, I was eager to read this book. And the setting and characters did not disappoint. However, the story itself was extremely slow-moving, and I got bored with the book at several points. The main problem was lack of stakes. If death doesn't mean anything, since people can download themselves into new bodies at will, then where is the danger? What are the consequences? Therefore, it didn't hold my interest.

Better than the Netflix series submitted by BurntSaori on June 17, 2018, 7:57pm If you liked the Netflix show I think you’ll be happy with this book. Well written and fun/disturbingly dystopian concepts; well rounded cyberpunk. The show made some upgrades: the Raven was much more interesting than the Hendrix, and Samir and Lizzie were much improved. Otherwise the book is much better. Read on!

Cool concept, dark story submitted by amandasreel on July 8, 2018, 9:47am I haven’t seen the show, but I thoroughly enjoyed this noir detective novel/thriller set in a futuristic dystopia. Was a page-turner for me, enjoyed the twists and turns in this setting.