Solo

by Robert Mason

Overview

Solo, the combat robot hero from Weapon returns. His mission: to rescue his traumatically twisted mechanical twin, Nimrod, from its CIA trainers. But Nimrod has other plans. Safely ensconced in his jungle hideaway, Solo uplinks to the satellite network that circles the globe, and discovered an amazing fact. He's not alone. There's another one like him. Code-named Nimrod, it has the same extraordinary physical and computer-reasoning abilities as Solo. In all senses but the biological, the two are brothers, bound by a tie they share with no other creature on earth. Determined not to repeat the mistakes they made with Solo and its humanistic education, the Army is conditioning Nimrod with electronically induced pain reinforcement. in fact, they've created a monster. Instead of the unquestioningly obedient robot it appears to be, Nimrod is a brilliant paranoid, with no moral core and the strength of thirty men. It is more than superhuman, and ultimately, it is uncontrollable. Leaving his sanctuary, Solo hitches a ride in the bilge compartment of a banana boat and arrives in New York—the one place in America his satellites scans have told him a six-foot-two, three-hundred-pound, man-shaped machine covered in carbon fiber may pass unnoticed—and prepares to rescue Nimrod. But the Pentagon knows Solo will not be able to resist the temptation of a soul mate, and using Nimrod as bait, it lures Solo into a trap meant to destroy the robot. As Solo strategizes his assault, Nimrod quietly begins to discover its power, and to plot its own violent revenge. The stage is set for the ultimate confrontation, one that will keep readers on the edge of their seats and once again establish Robert Mason as a unique master of high-tech adventure.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781892220097
Publisher:	Patience Press
Publication date:	01/01/1992
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	260
Sales rank:	231,571
File size:	689 KB

Editorial Reviews

In this sequel to his well-received first novel Weapon , Mason again weaves SF into a techno-thriller plot to produce a fast-moving action-adventure novel. Having faked his own destruction at the end of Weapon , killer-robot-with-heart Solo goes into hiding in a Central American village. But gung-ho Admiral Finch and his computer-hack partner Brooks learn that Solo is still loose and plan a search-and-destroy mission. The robot heads for New York to contact the other killer robot in development, Nimrod, which is currently in trainingwhat does this mean? under the malevolent Colonel Sawyer, who uses electronic pain to reinforce instruction.better?ss /now i get it/ pre Meanwhile, Solo's creator, Bill Stewart, has determined to save Solo, Nimrod and himself from the clutches of the military. Sawyer and Finch want to use Nimrod to trap and destroy Solo; Solo wants to save Nimrod and teach him to become a freethinking individual; and the novel hurtles toward a violent climax. The action is quick and entertaining, Solo is a likable personality and Mason handles the character relationships with panache, but most of the plot twists and angles are moribund and cliched. Not a bad diversion, but little else. BOMC featured alternate; QPB alternate. (May)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

In Weapon (Putnam, 1989), military scientists created Solo, a fully sentient robot equipped with access to most other computers on earth, who became a hero in a present-day morality drama. Learning what killing is, the robot opted out of the warrior role and ran away. As Solo begins, a second robot, Nimrod, is built to track and eliminate the runaway. Meanwhile, Solo wants to rescue Nimrod from his military owners. Roaming the country from New York to Florida, Solo makes friends such as Laura, a victimized New Yorker turned bag lady, and Adrian, a jolly Florida pot farmer. Solo's physical powers, far beyond anything available to robotics experts today, trivialize the obstacles he meets and lessen the fun of Mason's creative description of the robot's computing skills. Additional problems are the impossibly callous villains and the plot's dependence upon the earlier book. Otherwise, this is a glorious human-machine adventure. Purchase where such books circulate well.-- Elsa Pendleton, Boeing Computer Support Svces., Ridgecrest, Cal.

Library Journal