My original Serengeti by J.B. Rockwell audiobook review and many others can be found at Audiobook Reviewer.
The premises of this book were so good. During a battle between the Meridian Alliance and the Dark Star Revolution, Serengeti, a war spaceship, suffers important damages which make her to retreat, but with the bad luck that the ship gets lost and the navigation system breaks down. The few survivors go into the cryogenic pod to be ejected and send a stress signal, but the power failure prevents it. For some reason the stress signal cannot be send if the pod is still inside the main ship, so Serengeti and her robots will need to find a solution to this.
Ships AI are very special in Rockwell’s world. Their personality depends on the kind of spaceship they are in, and they have complete authority over the captain.
Here are two different story lines for different public. The first third of the book is about the battle and some character introduction. This part could be a little bit confusing because we also get presented with how ships AI work and the different kinds, but I would say it is the most science fictional part of the book. The second part is about how Serengeti and her robots try to get the lifeboat ejected. There is little science or science fiction here. If you are looking for science fiction facts, like me, you will be disappointed. There are some faulty attempts at techy babble, but it is just that, babble. On the contrary, there were a lot of characteristics and actions from the AI and the robots that you will never see in other science fiction books, like: shrugging, shivering, laughing, getting angry, blushing, melting with pleasure, being on the edge of robot tears. I also wonder how Serengeti stroked her electric fingers across the robots’ cheeks. This second part seems indeed a Disney movie for children, due to the fact that the AI is too humanized to be realistic, has feelings and a will, and addresses the robots like they were her children. And they behave like so repeating ‘tada!’ again and again.
Something that made me cringe too were the failed attempts to express techy concepts that were in fact, like explaining them to children: Serengeti’s interference over the lifeboat was explained like there was too much of her for the lifeboat to be able to send a signal; the cameras were called electronic eyes; Serengeti had ‘subminds’ (strange word for multitasking). It is also mentioned a couple of times that Serengeti’s mind is a hundred times more powerful than human. Well, that’s quite poor, I would say. There is also the fact that Serengeti asks one of the robots to fix his translation routine because talking to him is becoming tireless. From here the robot switches from beeps to actual words. This is just nonsense, since machines communicate at a much lower level. With all these details you see that Rockwell does not know much about science or IT, something essential if you want to venture into writing science fiction.
The second part of the book is full with Serengeti’s ramblings with many repetitions and reiterations, making it very slow paced. The goal here were saving the humans, which Rockwell tried to introduce in the first part and then later on in Serengeti’s dreams. Even like that, except for the captain, they were one dimensional and it is difficult to connect with them.
Elizabeth Wiley did a very good job in transmitting the endearing atmosphere between Serengeti and her robots, but sadly it also accentuated the fact that this book is like a movie for children. Male’s voices sounded like cartoon characters and the robots’ voices were just too cute and sounded like a movie from Pixar.
All in all, even with all the eye rolling I did while I was listening to it, I remember now the book with a smile. It is not a book for science fiction lovers, but I expect it to have much success among those who are not into science fiction. The story between Serengeti and her robots is beautifully told, and it would work well with the younger readers.
My name is Elena. Since I was a little child I loved science fiction and fantasy, and I can’t resist a good novel. In 2015, while wait I started to listen to audiobooks and I discovered the pleasure in being able to read while doing my daily tasks, so there’s always an audiobook playing on my phone. If you see me with my Bluetooth headphones on, please be gentle, I get easily startled.
I live with my boyfriend, which I met during my six-year stay in Belgium, four cockatiels, eight lovebirds, and a hamster in Madrid, Spain; and I like to spend my free time knitting and sewing while listening to audiobooks.
