Hammered

Elizabeth Bear’s Hammered is the first novel in the Jenny Casey Trilogy. This story takes place in the late 2060’s and much has changed between now and then. The US has lost power and influence and Canada has become a global power. Jenny Casey is retired from the Canadian Army.

During Casey’s service she was shot down and survived the crash with severe injuries. Due to these injuries she became one of the first people to have cybernetic implants, her left arm and her left eye, along with cybernetics in her spine. This happened over twenty years prior to the events of the novel, and as a result Casey is in great amounts of pain and the cybernetics are reaching the end of their life.

Casey has retired to Hartford Connecticut. There she has befriended a local warlord, Razorface, and a local cop. The novel begins with Razorface bringing Casey one of his underlings who has apparently overdosed on military issue speed. Later it is discovered that this was an intentionally released batch of tainted drugs.

It is very apparent that this is the first volume in a preplanned trilogy. The majority of the novel amounts to setup for later events. Due in part to the drugs, and also to her failing cybernetics, Casey is drawn back into the Army and a situation she really wants nothing to do with. Also key to the plot are the development of space faring vessels (retro-engineered from alien craft found on Mars) and the potential development of an actual Artificial Intelligence.

The major action in the storyline is so minimal that if one were to take it out of the larger framework it would almost be laughable. Very few of the characters that seem hugely important at the start of the novel are even involved by the end. This is a novel where the reader really does not have any clue what is developing until it happens.

Despite the fact that this novel seems to consist mostly of world building and arranging the characters and knowledge for following two novels, it actually works. The story is enjoyable if not completely a page turner. You want to know where everything is leading. Each character has so many personal machinations amidst the greater intrigue that paying attention at all times is key.

Hammered is far from your average sci-fi novel. It is more about intrigue and manipulating people and places than any sort of action or adventure. Bear has definitely put together the pieces needed for an epic adventure to be played out in the following books. Hopefully they don’t disappoint. I give this novel a 3.5/5.