All Systems Red Chapters 5-9
Raven: Hello everyone and welcome to All Systems Read: A Murderbot Podcast. I'm Raven, she/her.
Jess: And I'm Jess, also she/her. Hey Raven, how's your performance reliability?
Raven: I'd say probably like a 78%.
Jess: Oh.
Raven: I'm looking forward to the rest of the day where I do nothing. Jess, what's your performance reliability at?
Jess: I had a really good night's sleep. I've got a giant iced coffee. I'm sitting at like a solid like 90%, I feel like.
Raven: Wow.
Jess: I know, it's a big turnaround for me. Clearly we're recording this early in the morning, quote-unquote early.
Raven: Normally early mornings are my jam. Just had too much going on this week. Thank you everyone for your responses. It's always fun to read through them all.
Jess: I know that I mentioned it last episode, but you really do just get such a new perspective talking things out and looking through these responses. I'm so excited to actually talk about some of these because I was like, oh, I never thought of that before, and that's just fun for me.
For this set of questions, we were looking at chapters 5 through 8, finishing up Book 1 of the Murderbot Diaries, All Systems Red. And we did not do quite as many discussion questions for this half. Maybe we should have saved a couple from the first part, but that's fine. I will say that on this survey, I did remember to add in a question, is this anybody's first time reading through Murderbot? The answer was no. I suspected it was going to be no, but someday maybe.
Raven: I'm trying to get my friend that runs Book Club. Well, I'm trying to get Book Club to read Murderbot, but my friend that runs Book Club is a wonderful human being and she's the one that, well, she and her husband, I was letting borrow my physical copy.
And so I was like, well, yeah, I mean, if you want it back, but her husband went out and bought it when I took mine back. Byou could have read it in the last 10 months.
Jess: You should have them do this as Book Club. We already have all the questions ready for them.
Raven: That's what I told her.
Jess: Yeah. And we are putting the questions online just for historical purposes. Should anybody want to use them for a Book Club. Or just look back at what we talked about or email us in the future at allsystemsread (at) gmail.com and give us more thoughts and opinions. I promise we'll probably email back.
Raven: Chapter 5 starts off with Murderbot coming back online after forcibly shutting itself down.
Jess: A polite way to say shooting itself.
Raven: Shooting itself in the chest. Yes. I said it that way because its main objective was not to shoot itself in the chest. Its main objective was to shut itself down.
Jess: That is true. That is true.
Jess: And we didn't really talk about that at the end of Chapter 4, but that was a very shocking moment to me when I was reading it for the first time. It's a very high stake moment, even knowing what's going to happen. I'm still always like, want to move.
Raven: Every time. I think, “God I hate this part.” Chapter 5 starts with Murderbot waking back up, coming back online after a forcible shutdown. And the crew around it is very obviously freaked out. I think the person that is freaked out the most is Gurathin because Gurathin is very suspicious of Murderbot. So the first question we had relating to the books was, “Is it wrong for Gurathin to be suspicious of Murderbot? And then: What behavior and anomalies do you think he observed that caused him to review its logs?”
Jess: Obviously these books are strictly from Murderbot's POV. So Gurathin is set up to be our antagonist here. And so you kind of have to dislike Gurathin a little bit just from Murderbot's point of view, but I don't think Gurathin is wrong.
Raven: I really like how Gurathin is the person who is acting in the way that Murderbot would appreciate as reasonable and level headed if they were in a story from the entertainment feed. However, because this is happening in real life, it's just annoyed that he doesn't trust it.
Jess: Absolutely. If this was on the entertainment feed. Gurathin would probably be its favorite character of, like, look at that, like, paranoia and suspicion there. They have a lot in common.
Raven: They mirror each other.
Jess: Yes. 100%.
Raven: Reading through the responses we got, everyone agrees that it is very reasonable for Gurathin to be suspicious. And the first time I read through this, something I do remember, I was so wrapped up in, I don't want anything to happen to my precious Murderbot that I was thinking, “No, Gurathin's wrong”, even though really I knew Gurathin wasn't wrong.
Piper pointed out that the only thing they've ever heard of about rogue units are killing people and how that is just very blatant propaganda. Always comes back to the freaking corporation rim.
Jess: Ugh, the corporation rim. We're not really going to get into the TV show today, but I do think something in the Murderbot Diaries TV show that works well is they make it very clear that Gurathin has a history with the corporation rim. I think in the book it's kind of easy to gloss over the fact that he's a newer member of the team. I don't know if you remember the team made it clear to me, fully new to preservation as a whole.
But maybe I'm just dumb. I did not pick up on the fact that he had such a different background as everybody else. I thought he was just kind of a new co-worker, you know.
Raven: Yeah, I didn't pick up on it either. I assumed that new to the team meant previously worked on other stuff like with PresAux, new to this team, not necessarily the community at large.
Jess: That makes me feel a little bit better knowing I'm not the only one.
Raven: We did have somebody point out that since Gurathin is augmented, he can probably pick up on things that the humans would miss. And there's a lot that I don't understand about how the feed works since it's so ingrained in the culture. It's not gone into a lot of detail, I feel like. So the interaction with the feed is second nature to every character in the book, even the non-augmented humans.
But I know something in later books that we hear is humans will sub-vocalize when speaking on the feed, even if they're not speaking out loud. So there's stuff there that I wouldn't think about that I'm sure being an augmented human would make it give a little yellow flag. Probably not quite a red flag, but a yellow flag, for Gurathin.
Jess: That's probably a good point. And I think it was Sean who said, you know, Gurathin doesn't really get into the fact that he's like, I've noticed some things off until there's been this incident with the override module. I think it's very likely that as you're saying there are things that humans do that you notice on a subconscious level. So Gurathin easily could have been like something's off, but I don't know what is. The vibes were there for Gurathin. That's what it was.
Raven: Vibe check.
Jess: Vibe check.
Raven: One of the ways the PresAux team tries to see if Murderbot is going to kill them all or not is checking if it is in fact watching all of the entertainment shows that it has downloaded. And Ratthi makes a comment about the rise and fall of Sanctuary Moon that was purposefully incorrect and Murderbot cannot help itself and says, that's a fucking lie. I love this scene.
It is so funny to me. And I just know there are shows that I feel strongly about. And I don't think that even I have ever reached the level of love that Murderbot has for The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon.
Jess: It's such a good moment. So we were curious, is there something that someone could say would make you have a similar response to go: That's a fucking lie. Fandom related or otherwise, I suppose.
Raven: One of our responses was from Chris who brought up The Locked Tomb series, which if you haven't read it, highly recommend. It will tear your heart out, but that's okay. You don't really need that. And it mentions that in The LockedTomb that Harrow was not absolutely the most patriotic public servant despite her trauma. And I agree. That girl went through it because she was very staunchly a believer. I also would probably fight some people over that.
Jess: I know Piper mentioned that for them it would probably have to be somebody like shit talking their friends to get that. And I believe it was Sean who said you couldn't really imagine doing it for a fictional but like a personal accusation.
I could maybe do it about Murderbot. I don't know. I feel like I control myself pretty well and try to be nice, calm, cool and collected all the time. Very chill.
Raven: My favorite story of something like this happening in real life happens frequently, not as much as it used to. But my spouse is a lovely person, obviously I think that. And would go to friends' houses for board game night or hanging out or whatever. And when it was time for him to leave, one of the friends there would bring up a certain local politician whom my husband has beef with. And my husband would just start going on a rant about it because they were trying to keep him there so that they would get to spend more time with him.
Jess: That's so sweet but so manipulative.
Raven: Right? And everybody knew what was happening in this moment, but it was still, it is very much a, that's a fucking lie moment.
Jess: You can't help yourself.
Raven: It's really the combination of it not being true and being something that you care a lot about.
Jess: Yeah.
Raven: That triggers that response in Murderbot. Because it cares a lot about Sanctuary Moon. So for somebody to say a lie about the show it cares about when it knows the truth, it can't help itself.
Jess: And I don't think we're given a performance reliability at the start of the chapter, but it can't be very high. It is not a functioning at, you know, optimum efficiency and all that jazz.
Raven: Speaking of things Murderbot cares very deeply about, Murderbot will not say these words, but at this point does love Mensah. It thinks so highly of her. And during this whole event thinks she's a really good commander. I'm going to hack her file and put that in. Do we think Murderbot actually does this?
Jess: I think this is such a brilliant question. All the kudos to Raven for coming up with that because I don't know. I feel like I talk myself into circles about it. Ultimately, I kind of lean on no.
There's a lot of other things going on at the time. But then again, if they reveal in a later book that Murderbot actually did this, I'd go, yeah, it did. Way to go.
Raven: I could also see it going either way. I would want it to, but I lean more towards it didn't. And my reasons line up with a couple of the responses we got was either with what Piper says with it's too paranoid of being traced, especially in this first book that doing something like that might create some kind of link or give more ammunition towards hunting it down. Or as Lee mentioned, Murderbot's boundaries have been violated so often that it might see this as a violation of a boundary and wouldn't want to cross that with Mensah.
Jess: Don't think Murderbot is necessarily the best at boundaries itself, but in this case, that's fair. I did enjoy the hypothetical of what would Murderbot put in for all of the other files. I did enjoy the hypothetical of what Murderbot would put in for the other crews. I really enjoyed Piper saying, I think would fuck up Girathe and social feed pages in some benign annoying way.
And I think that is great. It wouldn't be anything malicious or bad, but just enough of the annoyance factor of it. That's the level of petty that Murderbot definitely has.
Raven: Mess up the algorithm.
Jess: Oh, it's going to ruin that algorithm.
Raven: I appreciated Chris's response of does it mention Arata's wibbliness? That's a fun word.
Jess: That's why Murderbot can trust her.
Raven: Sean mentions that it might put in something about Pin-lee's thoroughness and reliability. I think that especially comes through towards the end of this book and then in later books. It's respect for Pin-lee as the no-nonsense lawyer and then also something petty about Gurathin. I'm glad everybody's in agreement that it would do something very silly and petty to Gurathin.
Jess:: Yes, not malicious, but petty, which personally relatable. I have joked to many people of, do you want me to sign so and so up for spam emails?
One of the big reveals in the book is the fact that Murderbot did not need to become a mass murderer after hacking its governor module. It already was a mass murderer. For me, that was kind of a shocking moment reading through the first time I was one of those reading for fun, not the deep critical reading here now. So I want to know for other people, was this also kind of surprising for you? And not only that, knowing how the company handled the incident, how did we all feel about that?
Raven: Most people were not shocked or at least definitely not surprised at how the company handled it. Chris makes a really good point of, nope, I'm American and it tracks way too well. Both of us are and: yep.
Jess: Victoria was kind of there with me though going absolutely from the opening paragraph in the book, as a heartless killing machine, I was a terrible failure. Made me think the name it gave itself was ironic to find that this brave shy sec unit that cared so much about keeping its human safe was a mass murderer.
That was a jaw dropping moment. I think most of the people who submitted comments were split on how the company handled things. Clearly, second-units aren't cheap. They're going to try to recoup some of the costs, but it's still, it's weird. It's weird from a moral and consumer standpoint, I think.
Raven: It's a lot easier to reset an electronic device than it is to erase memories from a human brain. And obviously MurderBotisn't human, but the organic parts still carry a memory that a wiping of the storage cannot erase.
Jess: I do think it's interesting that Gurathin is the one to have the conversation with MurderBot about “Did the company punish you for this?” One, I think it shows a little bit more empathy to Gurathin trying to understand things and also Gurathin is probably the only one. I don't want to say insensitive enough to ask, but clearly less careful about SecUnit’s emotions.
Raven: I also think it's something that makes sense knowing Gurathin has had the most interaction with corporation rim companies, that it has a better understanding of how inhumane they are and getting and having a way to control these constructs that is going to be hard on them and painful and hurts them without reducing their ability to do their jobs.
Jess: Do you think if MurderBot said, yes, I was punished and it hurt? Do you think that would have changed anything with its relationship with Gurathin?
Raven: I think that if Gurathin believed it, yes, but I don't know if it would really change anything because it doesn't like to be so straightforward, especially with him. I don't know if Gurathin would believe, well, no, he might because of the aforementioned experience with corporation rim. I don't think MurderBot could trust him enough to be that open with him, even if it did see it as being the same because I know it mentions this is why humans are inferior. Us constructs and bots don't think of it that way, but it is. That is exactly what's happening.
Jess: For sure.
Raven: I really liked Piper's response to this question of I spent most of my first read just sitting with my fingers steepled and going, “hot damn!” the whole time. There's a lot of insight we get into how the corporation RIM works, how the company works, how constructs are treated in this short section. There's a lot of meat to chew on.
Jess: Absolutely, and I think most of us probably went into this book not knowing how much this series would mean. And it's like, oh, I'm tuning into what's going to be a fun little book.
And I'm always so impressed with the good novella and how much it's able to convey and have such depth. I know we've said that like umpteen times at this point, but we'll probably keep saying it. Thank you, Martha Wells. We love you.
Raven: Skipping forward to trying to find a solution to getting everybody safely off of the planet. The group has decided that they are going to try to execute the plan that Murderbot has come up with. And it's its first time making a plan as an openly rogue unit. How do we think it did?
Jess: I think it did great. I was so proud of it. One of the anonymous comments we got was, very well considering. And I think that really sums it up. It didn't go perfectly, but it's hard to make a plan go flawless without there being some changes and deviations. Improvisation that it had to do and Mensah having to go along with. Kudos to Mensah for trusting and being able to act so well.
Raven: Yes! The part where it goes to bring her back with the other sec unit, and that had to have been very stressful.
Jess: I also thought that was a very heartbreaking moment in the book. We do get that from Murderbot itself, being sad that it's one of the DeltFall units. Because as we've kind of learned, there's some awareness even with the governor module being intact.
So how much does that DeltFall unit know?, is it trapped inside or is it fully offline? I don't think Murderbot made the wrong choice, but it's still sad.
Raven: Yeah.
Jess: What a great look at its humanity, though. I guess I shouldn't say humanity. It would have hate that phrasing, but it's ability to have empathy.
Raven: One of the anonymous answers we got. I don't understand why it told GrayCris. They were trying to launch the beacon and then getting surprised when GrayCris wanted to go there. I might have misunderstood things, but that seems to be the obvious reaction and they didn't see it coming.
I will admit I had to relook this up in the book as we were recording to talk about this. They were not surprised that GrayCris wanted to go to the beacon. The flaw in the plan that they knew existed because Gurathin pointed it out was GrayCris forcing Murderbot and Mensah to go with them to the beacon. They were always trying to draw them away from the habitat because the SecUnits could go after the PresAux team as they came to launch the beacon.
Jess: My understanding was they wanted them to get caught in the blast of the beacon going off and eliminating some of the threats.
Raven: I don't know. I always assumed it was just drawing them away and not necessarily trying to kill or injure them, but it could be. Murderbot did say earlier in the book that it was wanting to kill the other SecUnits.
Jess: Maybe it's not a good plan. It is. It is a good plan. I'm just, I'm not the security consultant for a reason.
Raven: There's a lot of places that it could go wrong because they don't have a lot of experience with these other people. And one of the things that I think Murderbot is very good at is understanding how people think and trying to make decisions around how other people and other bots are going to react.
Jess: Since it's hacked it's governor Module had to be even more aware of how reactions are going to be. Hack that and put it in its file. Turnabout’s fairplay. We’ll also hack Murderbot's file.
Raven: Murderbot's got that thing on lockdown.
Jess: You know it. When we get to the end of the book, Murderbot makes the decision to leave. For me, that was pretty surprising. So I was just curious, was that surprising for other people? And do we think that's the right choice?
Raven: Adam said on the first read through, yes, but the more I sat with it, the more it made sense. If you're finally in a position to make decisions for yourself, why would you want to turn right around and put yourself in a position where others are making decisions for you? And that is how I was the first time I read it. I was so offended that Murderbot would just leave all of its new friends that worked so hard to get it freedom, even though freedom was still coming with strings attached because constructs can't be considered their own entity. But reading through it more and then knowing what happens later, it was definitely the correct decision for Murderbot.
Jess: One of our anonymous comments says, yes, to me, it sounded intrigued by preservation when it came up during the book and it's the logical ending. What it's supposed to want, like it says. So I thought it was going to stay as I thought it sounded pleasantly surprised when it got the news, previously listened to the audiobook, then it suddenly walks out.
I understand it now. It doesn't want the others to decide. Before I knew Martha Wells had only planned to write the one novella though, I also felt the ending was surprisingly final with no concrete set up for what was about to be next. I expected the next novella to also be about Preservation. And I definitely think when you go into a series knowing that there are more books, it changes some of your expectations.
Yeah, I thought we were going to continue on with Preservation as well. And kind of assumes Murderbot's probably going to live since it's the Murderbot Diaries. That being said, I could see a world in which Martha Wells would kill Murderbot, but please don't, Martha. I will. Anything you want to make sure that doesn't happen.
Raven: Victoria brought up that when it was asked what it would do on preservation, Murderbot wasn't happy or excited about the prospect. Murderbot leaving does seem ungrateful, but it really had no choice, it was only just finding its way as a free construct. She also points out that it certainly could have handled it better by talking to Mensah, but this is Murderbot we're talking about. It doesn't do emotional discussions.
And that relates to what Piper said was how she was delightedly surprised by it being a diegetic letter to Mensah, which I could be saying that word wrong. I've only ever read it, but that was really interesting and sweet at the end to see that all of these recordings and notes and stuff were being left for Mensah to kind of explain. I'm leaving you, but it's not because of you.
Jess: This is a very debated topic, I feel like, the question being, is the entire book a letter? Or are we just getting part of a letter at the end of the book?
Raven: I think the entire book is a letter and part of my reasoning behind that is in the book when we have something happen, so at the end of chapter four, “performance reliability at 10% and dropping, shutdown initiated,” is separated from the rest of the text and is in a different font. And that makes me think of it being a system log.
Jess: I really go back and forth. I've seen some really good arguments to go either way because before it gets to that end part of, I don't know what I want. I know I said that at some point, I think. The fact the novel continues on past the time it would have left the note. Well, I guess that's also another question. How do you think it left the note? Is it a handwritten note, a text document, audio recording?
Raven: It's going to be a package in the feed.
Jess: Oh, it's definitely in the feed.
Raven: The very end of it is :that's why I left you, Dr. Mensah, my favorite human. By the time you get this, I'll be leaving Corporation Rim out of inventory and out of site, MurderBot End message.: And that's how the book ends. So it, I mean, the book does continue after it leaves Mensah, but it's not.
Jess: The tone seems to shift though, between being this, what feels very much like a letter versus the recounting.
Raven: That's fair.
Jess: Especially in the audiobook version, which makes me go, well, it really depends what day of the week it is.
Raven: I'm not super attached to either theory.
Jess: There's really good arguments for both ways. And as far as I'm aware, I don't know if Martha Wells has said either way. But if anybody knows and could link to that interview or statement, please send it to us.
Raven: We asked a question of if anybody had any suggestions for topics that they would like to hear us discuss about the last four chapters. And one of our anonymous responses talks about MurderBot’s message. Was it just this last paragraph, the last sentence? Was it the entire novella?
Jess: We really did just talk in a circle about that. If you, our anonymous submitter, want to plead your case, would love to hear it because it's a great debate and would love to hear either way. The other thing they asked about was, is there anything that preservation could have done differently, if anything?
I am going to assume that they mean in regards to a treatment of MurderBot and keeping it from leaving. And I don't think there's anything they could have done differently.
Raven: I agree.
Jess: Even if they were like MurderBot, you are now going to be head of security for all of the preservation alliance. One, I think it would hate to have all that responsibility. I don't know, It might enjoy it actually.
Raven: I agree. I don't think that there's anything at this point that Preservation could have done to convince MurderBot to stay. It needs to be able to find itself before it can make a decision and settle down. And even if it knew that it would have a fulfilling job and the ability to watch all of the entertainment feed that it wants, I don't think that it would immediately go to Preservation.
Jess: Well, Preservation was unaware of, again, how, quote unquote, human MurderBot and sec units are at the beginning, you know, clearly they were surprised it had a face and that it could convey anything beyond just kind of this modulated response. I still feel like they were probably pretty good to it. They would have been good to any security unit. They're not going to trash or make it shoot itself for fun or things like that. They tried their best.
Raven: Something that we hear in this book, but we get to really experience in later books is how preservation treats AI bots, other various AI entities. And it treats them well. The people there interact with them as if they are people, like a sentient being that is capable of making decisions and doing their own things. And I definitely think that that played a role into how the team interacts with MurderBot before finding out that MurderBotis even more human-like than they expected.
Jess: Yeah. Even Gurathin, I feel like would still be respectful.
Raven: I do want to shout out Adam for apologizing if he made us feel self-conscious with giving us the correct answer last time. It was great. Thank you. I was making fun of myself because I missed it, but I would have just continued missing it if you hadn't pointed it out. So thank you, Adam. He goes on to mention that it took three or four times to read before realizing that MurderBot was sitting down. And everybody, thank you when you point stuff out for us that we may have missed because we're humans.
Jess: Yes, please correct us if we say something fully wrong or if we are fully missing a thing, even having consumed the series so many times. Still learning things that I have missed or misunderstood even. That's part of what makes it fun. And, you know, I guess we're kind of going through it a little bit more scholarly and taking notes and things this time around. Definitely is also giving a new perspective. One of the more serious topics we got came back from Piper who mentioned what's going to be a theme throughout the MurderBot diaries series is dealing with trauma and PTSD. And we do see the start a little bit of that with how MurderBothas dealt with its own mass murder incident.
It's really sunk itself into the entertainment feed. It is paralyzed by the ability to make choices, which is very relatable. It's hard to suddenly have options and decisions to be able to be able to make them.
Raven: I think this is something that becomes even more evident in later books as MurderBot has gets more experience with being its own thing and not having to pretend to be a Company owned sec unit. We get to see it react and think and learn about itself and its emotions and emotional regulation in ways that it would not be able to otherwise.
Jess: Piper specifically mentions anger and MurderBot clearly has some anger issues, but it's very well controlled, almost maybe too controlled at times. With how it handles things. We're trying really hard not to pick up topics from future books and incidents. I assure you, we will be talking a lot about mental health and therapy going forward. That is inevitable.
Raven: I think one good example from this book is Gurathin specifically trying to test it by antagonizing it and seeing what it does, which takes some guts to purposefully antagonize a rogue sec unit to see what it does. And I know that's something that was alluded to was discussed among the preservation, or at least among Gurathin and Mensah while MurderBot was out. Because Mensa talks to Gurathin and asks him, are you happy now? You made it mad and it didn't kill you.
Jess: Gurathin has some trust issues, but as you point out, that was really brave of Gurathin. Even when MurderBot is frustrated and hating Gurathin, it is still able to recognize and we as readers can recognize that Gurathin really does love its team at preservation.
And it is very committed to keeping them all safe. As always, we want to invite readers and listeners to submit their favorite quote and or scene from the section we just read.
Raven: One of our anonymous responders mentioned the buffering part, saying to leave sec unit and Mensah losing her shit and saying no. And yes, that was heartbreaking in a good way. Victoria also mentioned that scene about Mensah snapping “Shut up” Mensah snapped. “You shut the fuck up. We're not leaving you” and how it shows how much Mensah cares for it because she does not really curse. She's so distraught. She's like, no, you're not going to leave me. I'm not going to let you leave me. You're coming with us.
Jess: That scene has definitely made me cry before. I'll be honest on low days because what a gift it is to be seen and loved even when you are not altogether. It's a really beautiful and sweet moment.
Several people mentioned one of the very famous lines of “That's private.” And Adam specifically mentions that as a trans person, if their name had come out beforehand, you know, and before they were ready, would have been very upset that their consent had been violated. And that is a fantastic point. It's a very personal thing to share something like that.
Raven: Well, Adam, we're glad you're here and we're glad that you've shared your name with us.
Jess: Yes, thanks, Adam. And continue to tell us if we -
Raven: The next time we miss something, that's apparently very obvious.
Jess: Yes, quote us the sacred tasks, Adam. And know, we will never be angry at you for doing so. Sean called out a moment that I really love, which is when Valescu defends MurderBot. It's like, oh, no, the government module. It's definitely hacked, but I don't think that means it's untrustworthy.
Raven: And not long after that, Overse does something similar. “Why would it shoot itself to prevent the combat module from taking over if it wanted to hurt us?” and MurderBot thinks “I liked her too.”
Jess: That's such a big thing. It's definitely a lot of people's favorite, I think. I love Valescu. I am sad that they caught Valescu out of the TV show, even though I understand why. But thank you, Dr. Valescu. Appreciate you, bud.
Raven: Going off of that, Sean mentioned something about how in All Systems Red, the preservation team feels like NPCs. We don't get to know a lot about them. And I feel the same way. I think we might have mentioned this briefly in our last episode, but MurderBot is not connected to them for most of this book emotionally. MurderBot cares in as much as getting its job done and making sure they don't die, but does not care about them as people and so does not pay attention to them. And that comes across as us not getting a lot of information about them until later books.
Jess: Confession: I've definitely got the characters confused. I first, like, few times reading it because you just get a lot of - I'm terrible with keeping track of different names and we get dumped a bunch of names without a lot of context and identifiable information. The NPC comment, it kind of hurts, but Sean, is it wrong?
Raven: It's purposeful, the us not getting a lot of information about them, but we don't get a lot of information about them.
Jess: Chris has one of the things that I know I had marked down. I hate having emotions about reality and much rather have them about sanctuary moon. So fucking relatable. Chris, so relatable.
Raven: That wraps us up here with All Systems Read. Thank you, everybody, for listening and for participating in our book discussion questions. We are planning on doing the first four chapters of Artificial Condition for our next episode. So we will get those questions up when we release this episode and give everybody a couple of weeks to read those chapters, answer some questions, and then we'll start discussing that book.
Jess: Thank you to everyone again who has tuned in. There are more people who've listened to the first two episodes than I thought would listen to the entire series. And I can't think about it too much or I will have an emotion. To be honest, we are planning on talking about the TV show a little bit whenever we get time. So if you have any thoughts about the TV show you want to send our way, please do so. I know I mentioned our email address earlier. We’re on BlueSky Tumblr, Instagram, TikTok, the places that you can find most media things we are there. So feel free to reach out with any thoughts or comments. We would love to have them.
Raven: I’m Raven.
Jess: And I'm Jess. Thanks for listening.