I’m discovering that I’m rarely a fan of hard sci-fi, but do have a certain affection for the more cyberpunky bits of it (except, oddly, for the savagely dated Neuromancer; in fact, Gibson’s later stuff, which people don’t seem to like as much, is my favorite of his material). An even smaller subset of that, cybernoir, is an even bigger draw – George Alec Effinger is a good example of what I’d shove into this pocket, as is Jeff Somers.
Somers’ Avery Cates books are a bit like a classic noir novel, an action blockbuster and an episode of Leverage in one gritty, dystopian sci-fi package. They are bold, unforgiving exercises in gunfire mayhem, sarcastic banter, and improbable jobs that work just by the skin of their teeth. The books are more episodic and self-contained than serial, but characters and incidents follow through from book to book; Somers builds a world one hit, one dead teammate and one bar at a time.
Avery Cates is a Gunner, a hired killer trying to stay one step ahead of the System of Federated Nations, the one world government of Earth’s future. He’s worn out, pragmatic, disillusioned and the only thing that keeps him from letting someone put a bullet in him at this point is momentum and reflex memory. Avery is the best in spite of himself, and he’s probably the most likeable, most root-for-able bastard I’ve read in a long time. It’s well-trod ground, yes, but Somers manages to make the Cates series kinetic, fresh and personal in a way that some other authors in the genre either don’t or won’t.
The first Cates book, The Electric Church, deals with Avery being hired to assassinate a cyborg cult leader. The second, The Digital Plague, has the Gunner fighting for his life against a nanovirus that threatens to eradicate the entire east coast. The most recent, The Eternal Prison, puts Cates in prison. The fourth book, The Terminal State, is forthcoming. If you’re a sci-fi and/or noir fan, you should be reading these.
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