The novel “The Corporation Wars: Insurgence” by Ken MacLeod was published for the first time in 2016. It’s the second book in The Corporation Wars trilogy and follows “The Corporation Wars: Dissidence“.
A habitable planet has become part of a clash involving DisCorporates, sentient robots, and digitized minds split into a series of factions in which alliances can form and dissolve. There are sentient robots who prefer to remain neutral but any interaction with external entities can change the balance.
For digitized human minds, one of the problems is that their memories are incomplete. Who really are these digital versions of humans who lived centuries ago? Carlos faces an interrogation in virtual reality.
“The Corporation Wars: Insurgence” continues the trilogy set in a future where robots and the digitized minds of people who are considered criminals by the DisCorporates are used to do work in deep space. The story that began in “The Corporation Wars: Dissidence” is continued and reading the first novel is useful to get an idea of this fictional universe and some characters who are present in the second novel as well.
This second novel expands the story with a habitable planet at the center of a dispute that allows Ken MacLeod to introduce more characters. The first novel’s plot has its own continuation and is intertwined with other subplots. Carlos, the first novel’s protagonist, reappears only after several chapters but remains an important character in one of the subplots.
Ken MacLeod’s choice means that this novel is more complex than the previous one but also more fragmented. Conversation-based parts have increased and that means the pace tends to be slow. The Carlos-centric subplot is the perfect example of the problem with “The Corporation Wars: Insurgence”, as the reader can make a direct comparison with the first novel and see the action drop.
When reading a novel by this author, it’s normal to expect discussions on political and economic issues but this seemed to me to be honestly heavy even by his standards. The novel isn’t particularly long since the edition I read is 251 pages but if you’re not interested in very long socio-political dissertations they will seem 2,510 to you.
Among the new characters are other robots and artificial intelligences who bring their own points of view. In this case, in addition to the various socio-political discussions, one can also have some glimpses regarding the evolution of that kind of mind.
Newton is one of the new characters and uses an online persona that hides his true identity. There’s nothing special but the references to John Locke in the novel made me think of Peter Wiggin. It may very well be just a coincidence, also because it would be a curious inspiration considering the profound differences between Ken MacLeod and Orson Scott Card.
Maybe “The Corporation Wars: Insurgence” suffers from being the central book of a trilogy or maybe Ken MacLeod got carried away with the socio-political discussions. In any case, the impression is that the subplots had very slow progress and honestly I struggled to get to the end. This means more than ever that it may appeal to readers interested in the themes developed by Ken MacLeod knowing that they also have to read the final novel of the trilogy to get the full story.
