Mecha in Science Fiction Novels

[AJQ32]

While not Anime or Manga I thought this subject would best fit in this area of the forum.

I've been noticing in the last few years that Mecha has been popping up more and more in Science Fiction novels I've read. Here are a few examples.

Turing Evolved by David Kitson.
This book was released as a free Ebook. So it doesn't have the benefit of going through the usual editing process that hard copy books usually get. So you might see the odd misspelling or grammatical errors. Despite this it is still a good book and worth reading. Its kind of a love story mixed with Ghost in the Shell with a sprinkling of mech on mech violence. 3 and a half out of 5 ANGELS.

Mecha Corps (The Few, The Proud, The Machines) by Brett Patton
This is Brett Patton's first book and the first book in the Armor Wars series.
This one is a galaxy spanning story and starts with Matt Lowell witnessing his father being murdered when he was 6 years old. Then years latter gets an invitation to join the elite, and secretive, Mecha Corps and his adventures training as a cadet and latter getting picked to become a Demon Rider. The first to use the new Demon Mecha and he gets a chance to go after the man that killed his father. The Mecha in this book range from realistic ones called Imps that are considered obsolete, but still useful, to the Super Robotish Hellions and Demons. The Hellions and Demons are called Biomechas allowing their pilots to mentally interface with their machines, kind of reminds me of G Gundam in a way, to control them like they were their real bodies. But they are also able to merge, kind of like they liquify, come together and form something new and the pilots become mentally linked as well so it requires them to work together to make the merged mecha work. The Demons also have the added ability to shape shift into various forms to suit the situation. All in all a very enjoyable book. It even has a love triangle going on. 4 out of 5 Demon Merges.

A Soldiers Duty by Jean Johnson
The main character, Ia, joins the Space Marines, not out of civic duty by to protect the future. She's gifted, or cursed, with many mental abilities, one of which is the ability to see the future. In 300 years a disaster will befall our galaxy and the only hope is if she can set the right events in motion in order to save the galaxy. But she has to keep her abilities secret from her superiors or risk ruining everything she's trying to do. So the book follows Ia's journey through boot camp all the way to her first missions as a marine and how she got the nickname Bloody Mary. She uses what they call a Half Mech, which is pretty much powered armor, but not quite as flashy or compact as Iroh Man. The story has a lot of twists and turns that will keep you reading. 4 and a half out of 5 blown up aliens.

An Officers Duty by Jean Johnson
The follow up book to A Soldiers Duty and takes up where the first book left off and starts with Ia going home to the heavy world Sanctuary on leave before she goes to officers school. And all is not well at home. Ia further sets her plans into motion at home by setting up a resistance to a fanatical religion that would eventually try to take over their world. when she returns from leave she goes to officers school and eventually get an assignment on border control where she has a lot of adventures, most of which she uses her Half Mech. Again its got a lot of twists and turns that are bound to keep you interested. 5 out of 5 Blown up Dreadnaughts.

Mecha Rouge by Brett Patton.
The second book in the Armor Wars series. I'm actually still reading this one so I don't have much to say about it yet or give it a rating.

[LightningCount]

Interesting. I've spotted some of those.

What also comes to mind is The Road to Betrayal. This one almost could be an "anime" or "manga." It came out a while ago, but I've read that a revised and expanded version of the first book is in the works along with several sequels. Basically, it's a near-future story about an independent and secret army that uses mecha in a global government to protect against/cover-up alien contact while also protecting its advanced technology from getting into the outside world's military. A lot of timely themes, good action, and fun character relationships. Last I read, I believe it was going to be either later this year or next that the new first book and its sequels start to come out. The publishing world must be a tough thing for these kind of books to have caused so many delays, but I'm really excited to see this series get back off the ground after the hiatus. It's sort of an intelligent mix of Gundam, Robotech, and a more serious Men in Black. Gundam 00 has come out in the interim, and it has stuff in common with it, too. It's been obscure, but I'd recommend it.

As for other mecha books, the Robotech books by Jack McKinney are pretty good even after all these years, and I've sampled some Battletech books to various degrees, which are OK. The Gundam 00 novelizations Bandai released weren't bad, either.

[AJQ32]

Ok thought I should post the official descriptions from the back of the books here:

Mecha Corpse
The Few. The Proud. The Machines
A Novel of the Armor Wars
By Brett Patton

When man and Machine become one...

Matt Lowell is in hell--and there's no place he'd rather be. At a training camp on backwater planet Earth, and his fellow cadets are learning to ride Mechas: biomechanicals sporting both incredible grace and devastating firepower. Their ultimate aim is to combat the pirates of the Corsair Confederacy, who are constantly raiding Universal Union territories.

But before they can survive a battle, they have to survive their training. And as much as the robotic avatars are their greatest weapon, they may also be their greatest weakness. For every time Lowell and his comrades "plug in" to their Mechas, their minds are slowly being twisted and broken by an unseen power that is neither man...nor machine.

Mecha Rogue
A Novel of the Armor Wars
By Brett Patton

When you don't know which side to trust, go rogue.

Matt Lowell is the hottest new recuit in the Universal Union's select group of pilots. Their job: control the supremely powerful biomechanical robotic avatars know as Mecha. Now he has been offered and unprecedented opportunity: return to Earth to train a new elite force for a covert mission that's imperative to ensuring the future of the Union.

When his team and he embark on their mission on a border world that may be a target for the anarchical Corsairs, Matt finds that everything is not as it seems. The world is hom to a dark secret that underlies the very foundation of the Union itself, and suddenly Matt doesn't know which side he and his mighty Mecha should be fighting for--or against.


A Soldier's Duty
Theirs not to reason why
By Jean Johnson

Ia is a precog, blessed--or cursed--with visions of the future. She has witnessed the devastation of her home galaxy three hundred years in the future, long after she is gone, but believes she can prevent it.

Enlisting in the modern military of the Terran United Planets, Ia plans to rise through the ranks, meeting and influencing important people and building a reputation that will inspire others for the next three centuries. But she needs to be assigned to the right ship, the right company, and the right place to earn that reputation honestly--all while keeping her psychic abilities hidden from her superiors, who would refuse to risk such a valuable gift in combat.

To save the galaxy, Ia must become someone else: the soldier know as Bloody Marry.

An Officers Duty
Theirs not to reason why
By Jean Johnson

Promoted in the field for courage and leadership under fire, Ia is now poised to become an officer in the Space Force Navy--once she undertakes her Academy training. But on a trip back home to Sanctuary, she finds the heavyworld colony being torn apart by religious conflict. Now Ia must prepare her family and followers to secure the galaxy's survival. Her plan is to command a Blockade Patrol ship. Her goal, to save as many lives as she can. But at the Academy, she discovers an unexpected challenge: the one man who could disrupt those plans. The man whose future she cannot foresee...

[Amion]

...Yeah. If these are books, they belong in the general discussion topic.

And I have been wondering about the use of mecha in Western fiction of late, though honestly I'm more of a fantasy sort of guy, I get my science fiction from anime more than anywhere else.

[Vent Noir]

Does Steampunk count? Because if it does, then I'd heartily recommend Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan trilogy.

[ShadowCell]

oh wow herp derp i've been missing a lot of these lately

ka-moved >>

[AJQ32]

...Yeah. If these are books, they belong in the general discussion topic.

And I have been wondering about the use of mecha in Western fiction of late, though honestly I'm more of a fantasy sort of guy, I get my science fiction from anime more than anywhere else.

Then you might like the Brett Patton books. He says in the author notes that he got a lot of inspiration from Mecha Anime and Manga like Evangelion, Gundam and Macross. You even see some of the familiar tropes like the veteran sempai who's not afraid to dole out Bright Slaps and take his cadets down a few notches by taking them on in his own Mecha. Luckily pineapples where never mentioned. There's even the Coordinator debate over genetic modifications, or Genomod as they call it. There was even a war over it with a group of very heavely genomodded people called Humax, the Humax war a few centuries before the first book. Even Matt is could be a genomod since he has a photographic memory and a natural talent for merging Mecha.

[AJQ32]

Well I finished reading Mecha Rogue the other day and decided to write my review.

Without giving away too much I will say this was a very entertaining book. Matt starts out questioning his reasoning for living now that he has gotten revenge for his fathers murder and trying to find a new path to follow. He gets selected to train some new recruits for a secret mission only to find out something so shocking that he disobeys orders cause he realizes they are illegal and gets branded a traitor. He escapes with his Demon on a Corsair ship and has to join them. In which case he ends up learning that there is more to the Corsairs than the evil bloodthirsty pirates he was always told they were. This whole book show Matt learning and growing as a person and he is now driven to find out the secrets of the Universal Union and expose them for all to see. A lot of twists and turns and never a dull moment. I give it 4 and a half Secret Labs.