Mickey7

by Edward Ashton

3 out of 5

Synopsis

A sci fi adventure tackling questions of who we are, what is human, and how far would we go to stay alive?

Mickey7 is an Expendable: a disposable employee on a human expedition sent to colonize the ice world Niflheim. Whenever there’s a mission that’s too dangerous—even suicidal— the crew turns to Mickey. After one iteration dies, a new body is regenerated with most of his memories intact. Mickey signed on to escape from both bad debts and boredom on Midgard. After six deaths, Mickey7 understands the terms of his deal… and why it was the only colonial position unfilled when he took it.

On a fairly routine scouting mission, Mickey7 goes missing and is presumed dead. By the time he returns to the colony base, surprisingly helped back by native life, Mickey7’s fate has been sealed. There’s a new clone, Mickey8, reporting for Expendable duties. While Expendables make most of the crew nervous, the idea of duplicates is universally loathed. If caught, they will likely be thrown into the recycler for protein.

Mickey7 must keep his double a secret from the rest of the colony. That includes everyone from best friend and combat pilot Berto to his Expendable-hating superior Commander Marshall. Meanwhile, life on Niflheim is getting worse. Niflheim’s atmosphere is unsuitable for humans, food is in short supply and terraforming is going poorly. The native species that had helped Mickey survive his scouting mission, known to the colonizers as Critters, are growing curious about their new neighbors. And that curiosity has Commander Marshall very afraid. Ultimately, the survival of both lifeforms will come down to Mickey7.

That is, if he can just keep from dying for good.

Review

Mickey is an expendable, it's his job to die (and be rebooted), to preserve the more skilled colonists. But what happens when two of him survive.

I received a free copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is a standalone sci-fi set in the distant future.

It has become common practice for the human race to settle one world, then send colonisation crews to new worlds, to secure the future of their race.

Mickey lives on Midgard, which is a bit of a Utopia... and a bit boring for Mickey. He sees himself as a bit of a scholar and historian at heart, but those aren't occupations on Midgard, where all information is available readily.

When Midgard organises its first colonisation mission, Mickey will do whatever it takes to get on board; even take the job that no one else wants. His mind and body are uploaded into a file, and every time he's sent to a painful and inevitable death, they just print a new copy of him.

Mickey7 has died 6 times, during the mission to colonise Niflheim. But it's when he falls down a crevasse and doesn't die, that the problem starts. When he gets back to base, he finds Mickey8 in his room. Multiples are strictly banned, and if anyone finds out, one or both of them will be thrown into the bio-cycler (i.e. painful death).

I liked Mickey, he feels like such a normal guy, who made some bad choices back on Midgard. His "best friend" is a complete git, but Mickey knows that nothing and nobody is perfect. He knows that Berto is a git, but Mickey accepts his flaws as just Berto.

Mickey is very pleasant and pretty smart, through his narrative, you get to see his Expendable training, and also other colonisation missions throughout history (some successful, most not).

There is a long look at the theory and philosophy behind Expendables, and colonies. It looks at the morals and rules that have been established for various scenarios.

All of Mickey's training didn't prepare him for the fact that, even though they've been in this small community for years, travelling together and setting up the colony together, no one really talks to Mickey. Apart from Berto, and Mickey's girlfriend Nasha. No one wants to talk to the dead guy.

The not-so-good.

That's most of it. There are the creepers - giant wormlike creatures with pincers, native to Niflheim, and may or may not be trying to kill them all.

But most of the conflict in the book is either of the historical nature, or quite small and human.

The biggest worry Mickey7 and Mickey8 have is getting found out by the other colonists, because the leader of the colony is very anti-Expendable, and needs no excuse to get rid of them. And trying to survive on 1 person's rations, when rations are very carefully-controlled.

I liked following Mickey's stories and thoughts on other disasters, and theories, etc... but I kept waiting and hoping for something big to happen.

Towards the end, it was fairly big, but didn't feel it, if that makes sense.

I was also surprised at how different Mickey8's opinion of creepers was, despite everything Mickey7 had told him.

Overall, this was interesting, but lacked punch.

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