That the sexy stuff must be held at arms length makes the whole thing just feel a bit creepy to me. But, in this book the author, wisely, must skirt about the topics because the main character is a 14 year old pubescent girl. I would like a book with super nano-tech and fetishy, bisexual fox girls and androids overcoming a programmed craving to be sexually abused. I felt like the author was setting up situations to show how clever the author was with the tech to get out of the situation.įinally, lets examine the sexual aspects. The reader is conditioned early, that no matter what happens Alice will suddenly access some super tech that will enable her to overcome. I never really felt any sense of peril as I read this book. Regardless, some passages of this book read like a description of someone reporting what happens while their are playing some sci-fi / space battle / war campaign video game. I'm not interested in keeping all the technobabble straight (so that is just my preferences, I realize).

I suppose that it is really well thought out, but it just became oppressive to me. I love a bit of fetishy, sexy women pets, but not in a universe where it is the norm and not viewed as something outrageous. The captains, the doctors, the lawyers, the engineers, the security specialists, the crime lords - they are all men while women - or more like - cute women / animal hybrids abound in great numbers serving the desires of these men. every other woman in the book is somehow subservient to a man.

There are references to Alice's presumably-dead Mom and, Victoria, who is some empire ruler, but otherwise. where are all the other women? There is a brief appearance by a helms-woman who seems compelling. I like that Alice, the main character, orphan, female, age 14, is such a super ass-kicker. Good thing I’m not as helpless as I look. Kidnappers, slavers, pirates and yakuza - no matter where I go, trouble always seems to find me. Hoping to survive all the awful things that can happen to a girl on her own in space. Now I’m on the run, hoping against hope that the Matrons won’t try too hard to find me. What would they do, if they realized the Adjustments that were supposed to make me a meek little herd animal didn’t do anything? Even as a kid I knew not to trust the Matrons. I learned fast to downplay my abilities, keep my mouth shut and try to blend in.

There were other kids with mods at the orphanage, but nothing like that. It all seemed perfectly natural at the time. Forty meters off the ground, watching ships thirty thousand kilometers overhead, with senses that could pick out radar pings and comm chatter as easily as the ships themselves. When I was little I used to climb up to the highest branches of the housetree at night, and watch the starships docking at the orbital stations high above. My name is Alice Long, and I’ve always known I was different.

Perilous Waif by E. William Brown