The Engineer Reconditioned

Compared to 98% of the sci fi out there, this is right at the pinnacle. Excellent excellent writing, great plotting- creativity to spare. Bravo Mr. Asher- I've read this collection twice. The title story is a mini epic in itself and the rest of the stories are just as good. If there were any justice in the world, Asher would be a millionaire.

I found this book quite excellent. For Asher fans, it's a must and if you are new to the Polity universe, it's really quite good. I personally like the way that short stories work to immediately immerse you and entertain and Asher has done a great job here. There are some non-Polity stories that are good too.

"The Engineer Reconditioned" is mostly a collection of Neal Asher's earlier stories, with about 90 pages taken up by the title story- "the Engineer." Like Julie Czerneda, Asher can produce fascinating aliens with weird biological twists at the drop of a hat, and the Jain in the first story are a classic example. Certainly his alien life forms are very well characterized and have sufficient interest in themselves. Several of the stories are related to his full length (and riveting) novel "The Skinner" and his other stories are just as full of bizarre life forms, strange planets or weird situations, all masterfully handled in ways that keep one reading. As a professional biologist I like my science fiction to have some biological sense, and I am amazed at the number of life forms and weird life cycles (many of which can be found on a different scale here on earth) Asher has invented or altered. These are science fiction stories for hard core sci fi aficionados. Until Asher and Czerneda showed up I was beginning to think that the art had died (or at least been crippled) with the death of Isaac Asimov and the rise of novels associated with "Star Trek" or "Star Wars." This is a very good read and I heartily recommend it!

Well, I have been ranting and raving about how great Neal Asher is for some time now but I must admit I approached this short story collection with some trepidation. This was not due to any perceived shortcoming of the author, but rather that I have had a bias against short story collections for many years. I haven't truly analyzed my prejudice but I think it mostly stems from the fact that when a story is great you want it to go on and on, which definitely doesn't happen with a short story. Asher's collection, and a collection of short stories from Karl Schroeder, have made me seriously question my previous reservation. This book is wonderful and is chock-full of the trademark Asher icons we love and expect: fearsome and fantastical creatures, crazed religious cults, crazier terrorist organizations, artificial intelligences, crafty and devious humans, exotic locales, sentient machines, designer drugs, and struggling protagonists who must contend with all of the above in adrenaline fueled, blood-spattered, tension-ratcheting stories that leave you panting for more. Asher is simply a ripping good story-teller and in this book you get a dozen great stories under one cover. Many of these short stories are set in his Polity universe and add welcome bits of information for fleshing out that world and fans of his Polity series will definitely want to devour these. There are also a few stories here that are not Polity based....but they are so good that I found myself hoping that Mr. Asher might develop some novels around them. No, wait, I didn't say that!! I love the Polity novels too much! Maybe if Mr. Asher could clone himself as happens in some of his stories? I devoured this book during a five hour flight last week and it truly made for a wonderfully enjoyable, and very quick, flight if you can imagine that in this day and age. I highly recommend this book for both current followers of Mr. Asher and for those who may not have read him before. This would be a wonderful introduction to Mr. Asher's work and I am sure it would leave new readers wanting more.