Woken Furies
Encyclopedia
Woken Furies is the fourth published science fiction
novel by Richard Morgan. It is a sequel to Broken Angels
, and features the anti-hero
Takeshi Kovacs
.
This addition to the series casts light upon Kovacs' early life providing information on his post-envoy activities.
Morgan's official website and interviews suggest that Woken Furies could be the last Kovacs novel.
In the Kovacs universe, "Martians" are a long-dead, super-advanced, avian/winged species who disappeared from our galaxy, leaving behind inscrutable artifacts and a few pieces of operating technology. They are referred to as "Martians" by humans because our first discovery of them is on Mars. Their homeworld is unknown, lost in the millennium since they were active in any space humans have discovered. This mystery is compounded by the Martians peculiar habit of showing all maps with the local settlement at the center of the universe, rather than relative to a fixed homeworld or system. Martian civilization is covered in more detail in the second Kovacs novel, Broken Angels
, which centers around a Martian gateway.
Kovacs is on the run after making numerous attacks against the Knights of the New Revelation, an extremist religious order. He has declared a personal vendetta against the New Revelation with the express intent of killing every member, revenge for the killing of a long lost love and her daughter for violating the strict tenets of the order.
While trying to secure passage after his most recent attack, he saves a woman named Sylvie from a group of religious zealots. In return, she allows him to take refuge with her mercenary "deCom" crew as they head out to decommission sentient military hardware that has run amok on a nearby continent. Sylvie is the "command head" of her crew, coordinating their missions using embedded circuitry and software. During one of these missions, Sylvie collapses, and upon recovery her personality appears to have been replaced by that of long-dead revolutionary leader Quellcrist Falconer
.
The crew return to base where they discover a younger version of Kovacs has been illegally duplicated and is hunting them on behalf of the Harlans, dictators of Harlan's World. Most of Sylvie's crew is killed and Sylvie/Quellcrist is captured. Kovacs schemes to rescue Sylvie by approaching old criminal associates of his, the Little Blue Bugs.
The Little Blue Bugs mount a semi-successful attack on a Harlan fortress and rescue Sylvie/Quellcrist. Hiding from Harlan forces in a floating base, the neo-Quellists are sold out by its owner and recaptured. An assault by Kovacs and a single UN Envoy on the base ends badly when Kovacs is betrayed by the Envoy who was actually embedded with several colleagues. However, Sylvie/Quellcrist has established a connection with the AI/consciousness which operates the orbitals and calls down anglefire, eliminating their captors but sparing Kovacs and his original Envoy instructor and current revolutionary comrade-in-arms, Virginia Vidaura. Kovacs' younger self catches up with him and after a struggle, Kovacs decides not to kill his younger self but instead allow him life and the chance to make the same decisions he himself had to make. Nonetheless the younger self is killed by one of the survivors of the combat.
Kovacs, Vidaura and Sylvie/Quellcrist are left to wait and see whether they will be able to incite a planet-wide revolution with Sylvie/Quellcrist's newfound connection to the orbitals and the expansion of a long-dormant genetic virus which will turn the population against the ruling oligarchy.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
novel by Richard Morgan. It is a sequel to Broken Angels
Broken Angels
Broken Angels is a military science fiction novel by Richard Morgan. It is the sequel to Altered Carbon, and is followed by Woken Furies.- Plot :...
, and features the anti-hero
Anti-hero
In fiction, an antihero is generally considered to be a protagonist whose character is at least in some regards conspicuously contrary to that of the archetypal hero, and is in some instances its antithesis in which the character is generally useless at being a hero or heroine when they're...
Takeshi Kovacs
Takeshi Kovacs
Takeshi Lev Kovacs is the protagonist of the books Altered Carbon, Broken Angels, and Woken Furies by Richard K. Morgan, which take place several centuries in the future....
.
This addition to the series casts light upon Kovacs' early life providing information on his post-envoy activities.
Morgan's official website and interviews suggest that Woken Furies could be the last Kovacs novel.
Plot
Takeshi Kovacs finds himself back on his home planet of Harlan's World. Nine-tenths water, Harlan's World is surrounded by 'orbitals' that were created by "Martians". The Harlan's World orbitals are programmed to destroy any object of sufficient technological level flying above ~400 meters altitude and do so with high-energy beam weapons known as "Angelfire".In the Kovacs universe, "Martians" are a long-dead, super-advanced, avian/winged species who disappeared from our galaxy, leaving behind inscrutable artifacts and a few pieces of operating technology. They are referred to as "Martians" by humans because our first discovery of them is on Mars. Their homeworld is unknown, lost in the millennium since they were active in any space humans have discovered. This mystery is compounded by the Martians peculiar habit of showing all maps with the local settlement at the center of the universe, rather than relative to a fixed homeworld or system. Martian civilization is covered in more detail in the second Kovacs novel, Broken Angels
Broken Angels
Broken Angels is a military science fiction novel by Richard Morgan. It is the sequel to Altered Carbon, and is followed by Woken Furies.- Plot :...
, which centers around a Martian gateway.
Kovacs is on the run after making numerous attacks against the Knights of the New Revelation, an extremist religious order. He has declared a personal vendetta against the New Revelation with the express intent of killing every member, revenge for the killing of a long lost love and her daughter for violating the strict tenets of the order.
While trying to secure passage after his most recent attack, he saves a woman named Sylvie from a group of religious zealots. In return, she allows him to take refuge with her mercenary "deCom" crew as they head out to decommission sentient military hardware that has run amok on a nearby continent. Sylvie is the "command head" of her crew, coordinating their missions using embedded circuitry and software. During one of these missions, Sylvie collapses, and upon recovery her personality appears to have been replaced by that of long-dead revolutionary leader Quellcrist Falconer
Quellcrist Falconer
Quellcrist Falconer is the pen name of a fictional political activist/revolutionary often referred to in the Takeshi Kovacs series by Richard K. Morgan...
.
The crew return to base where they discover a younger version of Kovacs has been illegally duplicated and is hunting them on behalf of the Harlans, dictators of Harlan's World. Most of Sylvie's crew is killed and Sylvie/Quellcrist is captured. Kovacs schemes to rescue Sylvie by approaching old criminal associates of his, the Little Blue Bugs.
The Little Blue Bugs mount a semi-successful attack on a Harlan fortress and rescue Sylvie/Quellcrist. Hiding from Harlan forces in a floating base, the neo-Quellists are sold out by its owner and recaptured. An assault by Kovacs and a single UN Envoy on the base ends badly when Kovacs is betrayed by the Envoy who was actually embedded with several colleagues. However, Sylvie/Quellcrist has established a connection with the AI/consciousness which operates the orbitals and calls down anglefire, eliminating their captors but sparing Kovacs and his original Envoy instructor and current revolutionary comrade-in-arms, Virginia Vidaura. Kovacs' younger self catches up with him and after a struggle, Kovacs decides not to kill his younger self but instead allow him life and the chance to make the same decisions he himself had to make. Nonetheless the younger self is killed by one of the survivors of the combat.
Kovacs, Vidaura and Sylvie/Quellcrist are left to wait and see whether they will be able to incite a planet-wide revolution with Sylvie/Quellcrist's newfound connection to the orbitals and the expansion of a long-dormant genetic virus which will turn the population against the ruling oligarchy.
Release details
- 2002, United Kingdom, Victor Gollancz Ltd, ISBN 0-575-07325-X Pub date March 17, 2005, Hardback
- 2004, United States of America, Del Rey, ISBN 0-345-47971-8 Pub date September 27, 2005, Hardback
- 2005, Poland, ISA, ISBN 83-7418-114-1 Pub date 2006, Paperback