I am not (yet) well-versed in the Asher universe. I've only read one or two others and Locus reviews of a few more. The Technician makes constant reference to events in other books, especially the Prador War, but still works OK as a standalone. Space opera of the modern sort, which means big numbers tossed around freely -- intelligent (and hostile) entities that are millions of years old, space weapons capable of ripping planets and suns apart, population deaths in the thousands and millions -- and gory death and mutilation every few chapter, a penchant of Asher, Hamilton, and Barnes, and probably others. The story in this one revolves around a proctor of the Theocracy -- a willing if not particular major cog in a vicious religious government -- twenty years after the Polity and other forces toppled the govenment and a creature called the Technician chewed up most of him but didn't kill him, and left something behind. His story is interesting enough to carry the primary arc of the book, along with some revelations about where the Technician came from.

One annoying part is that scene shifts from one set of characters to another are completely unmarked by any whitespace. I don't know if this is an Asher gimmick to keep the reader off-guard or bad editing by the publisher (Night Shade Books), but I found no value in it.

Can't quite label this "recommended" -- it's just space opera with bits of horror -- but there's nothing wrong with it if that's your thing. ( )

Nobody does complex, far-future space opera better than the Brits. Neal Asher’s Polity series, which now has 20 volumes, is a case in point. The Technician is a stand-alone novel set on the ominously named planet Masada twenty years after the fall of the Theocracy. Masada is rife with leftover superweapons, genetically enhanced predator beasties, and diehard partisans. Jeremiah Tombs is one of the last Theocracy warriors. He barely survived an attack by a Hooder known as the Technician that ripped off most of his face. The Hooder is a beastie with an artistic bent. Polity agents work to save Tombs because they want to understand the Hooder. The Tidy Squad, a band of anti-theocracy vets, wants him dead, and the black AI Penny Royal has an agenda all its own. One style note: Asher renders machines as organic and animals as machine-like as possible. It is a trick that keeps the reader deep in the uncanny valley. ( )

One of my favorites from this universe. Compelling story, well put together, and makes more sense than many of the others (in some ways). ( )

This was a great addition to the polity universe. Looking forward to the next one ( )

Back to the world of the Theocracy and home to some of the most weird-ass creepy-crawlies in the known universe, twenty years after the Theocracy's fall.

What we have here is a seriously cool work of ideas and ongoing development and reveals. What I loved most about the previous Asher books was the grand mystery surrounding Jain technology, the aliens who destroyed their own intelligence to escape the weapon they made, and all the cool-as-shit AI's, partial AI's, quantum AI's, and all the ALIEN AI's.

Carry over a 2 million year mission from these old aliens to the present fiction day and here we go. :) The Technician. The assassin of assassins, the clean-up crew of a multi-genocide technology, including itself. :)

Again. Cool. Very cool. :)

And I love these drones. Polity peeps are CRAY.

I had a lot of fun here. :) ( )