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DOGS OF WAR – Adrian Tchaikovsky
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DOGS OF WAR : My Name Is Rex , I Am A Good Dog

Adrian Tchaikovsky
LIKE NEW, PAPERBACK

RM15.00

An Action-Packed Science Fiction Novel Featuring Genetically Engineered Creatures Bred For War .

Remarks Free Cover-Pages Wrapping
ISBN 9781786693907
Book Condition LIKE NEW
Format PAPERBACK
Publisher HEAD OF ZEUS
Publication Date 01 Jun 2018
Pages 352
Weight 0.4 kg
Dimension 20 × 13 × 2.5 cm
Availability: 1 in stock

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★★ A NEW SCIENTIST BOOK OF THE YEAR ★★
 
My name is Rex. I am a good dog.
 
Rex is a Good Dog. He loves humans. He hates enemies. He’s utterly obedient to Master. Rex is also seven foot tall at the shoulder, bulletproof, bristling with heavy caliber weaponry, and his voice resonates with subsonics especially designed to instill fear.
 
With Dragon, Honey, and Bees, he’s part of a Multiform Assault Pack operating in the lawless anarchy of Campeche, Mexico. A genetically engineered Bioform, he’s a deadly weapon in a dirty war. All he wants to be is a Good Dog. And to do that he must do exactly what Master says and Master says he’s got to kill a lot of enemies.
 
But who, exactly, are the enemies? What happens when Master is tried as a war criminal? What rights does the Geneva Convention grant weapons? Do Rex and his fellow Bioforms even have a right to exist? And what happens when Rex slips his leash?


Our main protagonist is Rex – a dog/human bioform who is the leader of a multi-form pack which includes Honey – a bear form, Dragon – a snake form, and Bees – a ‘distributed intelligence’ of augmented bees. The pack is run by the Redmark corporation who are called in to suppress an anarchist revolt in southern Mexico.
 
Of course, things don’t go smoothly and when the pack loses communications and has to make their own decision for a short while, things eventuate from there. Rex isn’t the only point of view character but his arc from loyal wardog who wants to be nothing more than to be told he’s a Good Dog by his Master to a fully realised personality that makes independent moral choices is the one which is really important.
 
All the other characters are well realised, with varied levels of inscrutability and even those who get limited or no point of view segments like Hartnell or Murray are developed and compelling in their own way. Rex is a soldier. He is the loyal Dog-Man with an expensive designer body that is his armor and also his prison. But he doesn’t understand himself or others enough to make informed decisions, or develop a worldview or opinions of his own.
 
He doesn’t want to think—he wants Master and Honey to do the thinking for him. Thinking is hard work, and one can easily make mistakes which Rex can’t afford to make—Master doesn’t like Bad Dog. Rex is happy when his feedback implants tell him he is a Good Dog, when Master tells him “Good Dog.” He doesn’t want to be a leader, either—it involves making choices, and it’s difficult when the lives of his kind are at stake, when one bad decision or choice could take away their rights and freedom.
 
In other words, Rex doesn’t want to question the law, or fight for himself or his kind, until he becomes truly human through years of trials and errors, sentience-information-experience leading to emotional intelligence. The fundamental nature of the dog is good, not evil—and perhaps it’s this underlying belief that makes most characters in the book equally good and likeable, especially Honey, the super-intelligent bear who wants to be a college professor. For a novel about bloody war and action, there is also a lot of laughter and love in this book.
 
Dogs of War is ultimately a story of hope; Tchaikovsky knows that human laws and societies are malleable—they can be hacked—and change is possible. And he deserves praise for exploring the legal, ethical, and existential questions that will soon confront humanity regarding synthetic life and organic robots with a simplicity of prose and masterful insight. This breadth of vision coupled with the immediacy of its subject matter and its terrific menagerie of bioforms, certainly makes Dogs of War a highly topical and worthwhile, as well as entertaining, read. Highly recommended.
 
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About Author :
 
Adrian Tchaikovsky was born in Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire before heading off to Reading to study psychology and zoology. For reasons unclear even to himself he subsequently ended up in law and has worked as a legal executive in both Reading and Leeds, where he now lives. Married, he is a keen live role-player and occasional amateur actor, has trained in stage-fighting, and keeps no exotic or dangerous pets of any kind, possibly excepting his son.
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