Books › Broken Angels
Broken Angels
A Takeshi Kovacs Novel
560 pages
A brutal, high-octane plunge into a war-torn future where bodies are expendable and survival demands a ruthless edge.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like being dropped into a hostile, irradiated warzone with only your wits and a heavy pulse rifle to keep you alive. It trades the neon-lit noir of its predecessor for the blood-soaked trenches of military sci-fi, delivering a relentlessly propulsive and gritty experience. The atmosphere is oppressive and adrenaline-fueled, steeped in the cynical reality of a universe where human consciousness is just another corporate asset to be downloaded and deployed. The prose is visceral, hitting with the kinetic force of a firefight while still pausing to chew on the bleak philosophical implications of immortality and endless war. It will absolutely delight readers who want their cyberpunk ultra-violent, morally gray, and unapologetically brutal.
- Mood
- adrenaline-fueled
- blood-soaked
- oppressive
- war-torn
- Tone
- cynical
- hardboiled
- gritty
- pragmatic
- bleak
- Pace
- propulsive
- Themes
- commodification of the body · trauma of endless war · corporate exploitation · alien mysteries · survival at any cost
- The writing
- Visceral and unapologetically graphic, the prose blends hardboiled noir cynicism with dense, kinetic military sci-fi action.
- The arc
- The journey moves from cold, mercenary detachment to a grim, adrenaline-fueled reckoning with the sheer scale of human and corporate depravity.
- Who it's for
- Readers who crave ultra-violent, philosophically dense cyberpunk and military sci-fi anchored by a deeply flawed, relentlessly pragmatic antihero.
Content notes
- graphic violence
- gore
- sexual content
- torture
- body horror
- war trauma
About the book
Welcome back to the brash, brutal new world of the twenty-fifth century: where global politics isn't just for planet Earth anymore; and where death is just a break in the action, thanks to the techno-miracle that can preserve human consciousness and download it into one new body after another. Cynical, quick-on-the-trigger Takeshi Kovacs, the ex-U.N. envoy turned private eye, has changed careers, and bodies, once more... trading sleuthing for soldiering as a warrior-for-hire, and helping a far-flung planet's government put down a bloody revolution.But when it comes to taking sides, the only one Kovacs is ever really on is his own. So when a rogue pilot and a sleazy corporate fat cat offer him a lucrative role in a treacherous treasure hunt, he's only too happy to go AWOL with a band of resurrected soldiers of fortune. All that stands between them and the ancient alien spacecraft they mean to salvage are a massacred city bathed in deadly radiation, unleashed nanotechnolgy with a million ways to kill, and whatever surprises the highly advanced Martian race may have in store. But armed with his genetically engineered instincts, and his trusty twin Kalashnikovs, Takeshi is ready to take on anything--and let the devil take whoever's left behind.From the Trade Paperback edition.
Description from Open Library.
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