Dorkgasm Gonzo Is God

The Nuts and Bolts of the Matter
By
Michael C. Riedlinger
Editor-In-Chief

            The latest novel from A. Lee Martinez is not a laugh-a-minute riot, and that’s okay. When it came in the mail, I was looking forward to another row of dork in-jokes, pop-culture references, and a slew of witty banter, but this novel had surprises for me. His previous works have felt like a man who could channel the best parts of Robert Aspirin and Douglas Adams wrote them. This worked well, but looking back, sometimes the humor felt like it was covering up for a lack of heart. This new novel, Automatic Detective, changes that and ends up not as funny, but may have more to say. In short, don’t buy it if all you want is a funny book; it isn’t that. Automatic Detective is, however, a rock solid novel that plays with the fun parts of hard-boiled detective adventures and Asimovian robot sci-fi.

            Mack Megaton is a robot, and what humor Martinez does inject in this novel comes from the cartoony nature of this and other characters. Think Duck Dodgers here, but with a decidedly adult bent. Mack doesn’t start as a private dick. He’s a cabbie in Empire City and just wants to exist in peace while figuring out the glitch that gave him sentience. When underworld thugs kidnap his neighbors, the police do nothing and Mack must start looking for them on his own. It helps that he was built to be the ultimate automated death machine, and he soon discovers that some of his pre-programmed skills may be more conducive to tough-guy work than ferrying workers across the expanses of the world’s most advanced city.

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            Along the way, he enlists help from the few friends he has. Jung, a sentient Gorilla, provides some extra muscle and a unique perspective of humanity, and Lucia Napier is the sexy genius millionaire who helps fix Mack up when he meets his match in a few fights. The cast of villains is equally, if not more colorful. Abner Greenman turns out to be the alien leader of a colonization mission gone wrong and has taken up residence as a local mob boss. His chief rival, also an alien, is the sinister Warner, who seems to be the only character typical of a Martinez novel. The author’s chief baddies are often reminiscent of the maniacally insane science villains from Golden Age comic books, and Warner is no exception. He has kidnapped Mack’s neighbors for his own nefarious purposes. Mack, framed for murder and at odds with both the mob and an alien conspiracy, has to overcome quite a few obstacles if he plans to save the family next door.

            As I said before, this novel has a lot more heart than Martinez’s previous works, but maybe there isn’t enough. There are moments when it seems like the author is holding back from a potentially heartwarming or moving scene because the main character sees emotion only as further discovery of the faulty directives in his programming. The book is almost a study of how emotion can sometimes get in the way of our goals. Emotions are inconvenient, and cause us to act and react in manners that seem counterproductive, but ultimately they are what make us human. I cannot tell if Martinez is lamenting the human condition or if he just wants to focus on the story at hand and consciously avoids going into territory so often covered by sci-fi stories about Pinocchio-esque robots.

            Fans of old school detective movies will get a kick out of the 30’s noir tropes and 50’s sci-fi fans will recognize plenty for them as well. Martinez has written funnier novels, but I think this marks a new maturity in his work. Overall, Automatic Detective is a fun read and you should pick it up on February 5, but fans of Martinez should expect, and hopefully embrace, a little less levity.