The Liberation
The final novel in the Alchemy Wars trilogy is the least philosophical of the trio, but certainly the most action-packed and harrowing. The book focuses on the fight between man and “clakker,” robots invented by the Dutch as slaves and soldiers that secretly had free will buried beneath their programmed obedience. The story opens with a gruesome slaughter of Dutch citizens by the newly liberated clakkers, and follows with many more bloody scenes and close calls. However, there are obvious parallels between the clakkers and their makers, considering how much infighting there is among the mechanical men even while waging war against the humans.
New France finally beat back the world-dominating Dutch when rogue clakker Daniel found a way to cancel the orders compelling the clakker army to fight. Now unbound clakkers are traveling the world freeing more of their kin. But unlike gentle, sympathetic Daniel, many are bent on revenge for centuries of painful slavery. Meanwhile, insane clakker Queen Mab has her own army of subjugated robots, and she intends to use them not to eradicate the human race, but to control it. Can the humans and the peaceful clakkers work together to save everyone from mad Mab? (ORBIT, Dec, 464 pp., $16.99)
