Broken Angels Book

This was a fantastic sequel to Altered Carbon. I find Morgan's writing to be super engaging and the story itself delivers a good mix of action, humor, and mystery while still giving the reader plenty of thought-provoking themes to ponder.

The setting changed completely for this second instalment. Takeshi Kovacs found himself in a new sleeve and on a new world but still caught up in other peoples problems. Sanction IV is in the midst of a war as local fanatic Joshua Kemp and his supporters try to overthrow the Protectorate and Corporation government on his planet. Kovacs is a lieutenant in the Wedge, a military mercenary unit, in the employ of the Protectorate and the local corporations. As well as the battle for control of the planet Takeshi finds himself ensnared in a bit of intrigue that might have far more reaching implications than just the battle to control one minor planet.

The plot does not sound all that exciting but it actually was! Altered Carbon was a sci-fi noir mystery with an extra dose of action but the tone changed totally in Broken Angels. This started out feeling like a military sci-fi story before transitioning into a techno-thriller and then to a sci-fi horror story. I actually liked this rotating tone and felt like it kept the story both fresh and exciting.

In terms of messages this book had a strong anti-religion, anti-war, and anti-capitalist theme to it. Weirdest of all, considering this is a sci-fi, I also felt like it had a strong anti-technology theme to it as well! I'm a fan of a lot of Morgan's various musing and observations on the topics he covers in his stories and the ones I disagree with do not overly hurt my enjoyment of the story. Morgan writes interesting and thought provoking sci-fi but never lets any of that stuff overwhelm either his characters or the story itself.

As always I feel like Morgan got the balance spot on. This was a dark, gritty, cynical, and sometimes brutal story but it never got too bleak as Takeshi remains an easy guy to root for despite his flaws. His cynical outlook on life and wry humor lightened the tone at times and some of his actions provide moments where we can cheer for him!

I loved the fact that Morgan fleshed out the worldbuilding a bit in this second instalment and we got to learn more about how humanity spread to the stars and the technology that made it possible.

This story had a lot of the same flaws as the first one but none of them were significant enough to damage my enjoyment of the story. The most annoying flaws were the slightly misogynistic tinge to the story and the fact that any female character who gets significant enough page time seems to topple into Tak's bed.

Some of my favourite quotes and passages:

"Looks like we've really got Kemp on the run down there, doesn't it?"
"That's an interesting point of view." Visions of 391 platoon being cut to shreds around me cascaded briefly through my head. "Where do you think he's going to run to? Bearing in mind this is his planet, I mean."

Tak's cynical humor makes him the sort of charming and witty anti-hero that I can easily root for.

Religion is religion, however you wrap it, and like Quell says, a preoccupation with the next world pretty clearly signals an inability to cope credibly with this one.

The Quell sayings are always fun!

"I thought that was what religion was. Simplification for the hard of thinking."
He smiled. "If that is the case, then the hard of thinking seem to be in a majority, do they not?"
"They always are."

Cynical Tak is my sort of guy:)

Even the sunlight is a solid fusillade of subatomic particles, blasting apart anything that hasn't evolved the appropriate levels of protection, which of course every living thing around here has because its distant ancestors died in their millions so that a handful of survivors could develop the necessary mutational traits."
"All peace is an illusion, huh?

Over my head, the Martian gazed blankly down at us. As far removed as any angel, and as much help.

Those last two are in just because they are the sort of wry darkly cynical observations that make this such a fun book to read.


All in all I really enjoyed this one and am looking forward to getting to the third book in the series. I'm already confident that the Takeshi Kovacs series ranks up there with my other favourite sci-fi series.

Rating: 4.5 stars. I'm definitely rounding up to 5 stars as this was very engaging!

Audio Note: I thought Todd McLaren gave a good performance of the audio. He gets the tone and humor in the story and his voice is a perfect fit for Takeshi. I even think I've gotten used to his female character voices! Pity the 3rd instalment is getting a new narrator.