Martha Wells



Martha Wells (born September 1, 1964) is an American writer of speculative fiction.

All Systems Red (2017)

 * All page numbers are from the trade paperback first edition published by Tor, ISBN 978-0-7653-9753-9
 * Won the 2018 Hugo, Nebula, and Locus awards for best novella


 * That sounded like a great plan, in that it didn’t involve me.
 * Chapter 2 (p. 32)


 * They’re academics, surveyors, researchers, not action-hero explorers from the serials I liked because they were unrealistic and not depressing and sordid like reality.
 * Chapter 3 (p. 50)

Artificial Condition (2018)

 * All page numbers are from the hardcover first edition published by Tor, ISBN 978-1-250-18692-8
 * Won the 2019 Hugo and Locus awards for best novella, and was nominated for the 2019 Nebula


 * SecUnits don’t care about the news…mostly because the news was boring and I didn’t care what humans were doing to each other as long as I didn’t have to a) stop it or b) clean up after it.
 * Chapter 1 (p. 9; ellipsis represents the elision of several minor reasons)


 * I would defer to your expertise in shooting and killing things. You should defer to mine in data analysis.
 * Chapter 4 (p. 54)


 * Yes, the giant transport bot is going to help the construct SecUnit pretend to be human. This will go well.
 * Chapter 4 (p. 60)


 * I am terrible at estimating human ages because it’s not one of the few things I care about. Also most of my experience is with the humans on the entertainment feed, and they aren’t anything like the ones you see in reality. (One of the many reasons I’m not fond of reality.)
 * Chapter 4 (p. 64)


 * Humans are nervous of me because I’m a terrifying murderbot, and I’m nervous of them because they’re humans.
 * Chapter 4 (pp. 65-66)


 * Young humans can be impulsive. The trick is keeping them around long enough to become old humans. This is what my crew tells me and my own observations seem to confirm it.
 * Chapter 7 (p. 125)


 * I was only 97 percent certain this meeting was a trap.
 * Chapter 7 (p. 138)

Rogue Protocol (2018)

 * All page numbers are from the hardcover first edition published by Tor, ISBN 978-1-250-19178-6


 * There needs to be an error code that means “I received your request but decided to ignore you.”
 * Chapter 1 (p. 10)


 * They were all annoying and deeply inadequate humans, but I didn’t want to kill them. Okay, maybe a little.
 * Chapter 1 (p. 13)


 * I know that’s actually not a permanent solution and pretending bad things aren’t happening is not a great survival strategy in the long run, but there was nothing I could do about it now.
 * Chapter 5 (pp. 112-113)


 * This was another reason I didn’t like human security consultants. Some of them enjoyed their job too much.
 * Chapter 5 (p. 119)

Exit Strategy (2018)

 * All page numbers are from the hardcover first edition published by Tor, ISBN 978-1-250-19185-4


 * Possibly I was overthinking this. I do that; it’s the anxiety that comes with being a part-organic murderbot. The upside was paranoid attention to detail. The downside was also paranoid attention to detail.
 * Chapter 1 (p. 14)


 * Hard work really did make you improve; who knew?
 * Chapter 1 (p. 15)


 * The station approach traffic was heavy, and we were showing a twenty-seven-minute docking delay. Twenty-seven minutes was more than enough time for me to do something stupid.
 * Chapter 2 (p. 38)


 * Real humans don’t act like the ones in the media.
 * Chapter 3 (p. 56)


 * The company is like an evil vending machine, you put money in and it does what you want, unless somebody else puts more money in and tells it to stop.
 * Chapter 3 (p. 67)


 * This lobby was on multiple levels and had large square biozones depicting different ecologies, with furniture arranged around them. It looked nice, inviting humans to sit around and discuss proprietary information in the hotel’s choked feed so the hotel could record it and sell it to the highest bidder.
 * Chapter 4 (p. 76)


 * Disinformation, which is the same as lying but for some reason has a different name, is the top tactic in corporate negotiation/warfare.
 * Chapter 5 (p. 96)


 * “I don’t want to be human.” Dr. Mensah said, “That’s not an attitude a lot of humans are going to understand. We tend to think that because a bot or a construct looks human, its ultimate goal would be to become human.” “That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”
 * Chapter 8 (pp. 154-155)


 * It was very dramatic, like something out of a historical adventure serial. Also correct in every aspect except for all the facts, like something out of a historical adventure serial.
 * Chapter 8 (p. 158)

Network Effect (2020)

 * All page numbers are from the hardcover first edition published by Tor, ISBN 978-1-250-22986-1, 5th printing


 * I’ve had clients who thought they needed an absurd level of security. (And I’m talking absurd even by my standards, and my code was developed by a bond company known for intense xenophobic paranoia, tempered only by desperate greed.) I’ve also had clients who thought they didn’t need any security at all, right up until something ate them.
 * Chapter 1 (p. 1)


 * Humans have a bad tendency to use weapons unnecessarily and indiscriminately. Of the many times I had been shot, a depressingly large percentage of hits had come from clients who were trying to “help” me.
 * Chapter 2 (pp. 20-21)


 * Data suggests family dramas bear a less than 10 percent resemblance to actual human families, which is unsurprising and also a relief, considering all the murders. In the dramas, not Mensah’s family.
 * Chapter 3 (p. 38)


 * She said that in the normal human adolescent exasperated and borderline whiney tone. (That’s actually statistically normal for human adults, too.)
 * Chapter 8 (pp. 135-136)


 * “Was that a subtle threat?” I said, “No. It wasn’t subtle.”
 * Chapter 8 (p. 142)


 * (If I got angry at myself for being angry I would be angry constantly and I wouldn’t have time to think about anything else.) (Wait, I think I am angry constantly. That might explain a lot.)
 * Chapter 11 (p. 205)


 * Self-determination was a pain in the ass sometimes but it beat the alternative by a lot.
 * Chapter 11 (p. 210)


 * For a being as sophisticated as you are, it is baffling how little understanding you have of the composition of your own mind.
 * Chapter 12 (p. 225)


 * It wasn’t a foolproof method but it was 90 percent effective. (Foolproof is another weird word. Shouldn’t it be smartproof? It’s not like you’re going to breach and seize control of a ship attached to a space dock by tripping or forgetting to bring your weapon or something.)
 * Chapter 12 (p. 228)


 * But I couldn’t ignore it. I mean, I guess I couldn’t. Ignoring stuff is always an option, up until it kills you.
 * Chapter 18 (p. 309)


 * Wow, that sounded pathetic. Like the “I want to be special! How come I’m not?” crap humans pull all the time.
 * Chapter 19 (p. 327)


 * Because change is terrifying. Choices are terrifying. But having a thing in your head that kills you if you make a mistake is more terrifying.
 * Chapter 20 (p. 345)

Fugitive Telemetry (2021)

 * All page numbers are from the hardcover first edition published by Tor, ISBN 978-1-250-76537-6


 * The big danger to humans is not raiders, angry human-eating fauna, or rogue SecUnits; it’s other humans. They kill each other either accidentally or on purpose and you have to clear that up fast because it jeopardizes the bond and determines whether the company has to pay out damages on it or not.
 * Chapter 1 (p. 9)


 * I had archives of everything that had happened since I hacked my governor module, but I hadn’t had as much relevant experience in that time. But what I did have were thousands of hours of category mystery media, so I had a lot of theoretical knowledge that was possibly anywhere from 60 to 70 percent inaccurate shit.
 * Chapter 1 (pp. 10-11)


 * Since she was human she was doing it slowly (it was like watching algae grow).
 * Chapter 2 (p. 16)


 * I can’t tell if that’s you being passive aggressive or you being willfully obtuse.
 * Chapter 4 (p. 49)


 * Maybe exploring every possible outcome of each action in an inescapable loop of paranoia and anxiety wasn’t the most normal reaction-state but hey, if it was, there would be a lot fewer stupid murders.
 * Chapter 8 (pp. 161-162)