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Rose House
Une maison dotée d’une intelligence artificielle, ça n’a rien d’extraordinaire. Mais une maison dont chaque poutre porteuse, chaque carreau de marbre abrite une entité pensante non humaine, c’est beaucoup moins courant. Depuis la mort de son génial concepteur un an plus tôt, Rose House est hermétiquement close, conformément au testament de l’architecte. Pourtant, l’IA signale à la police locale la présence d’un cadavre entre ses murs.
Comment cette personne a-t-elle pu s’y introduire ? Qui l’a tuée ? Rose House est-elle réellement vide ? L’IA est-elle fiable ? Telles sont les questions auxquelles va devoir répondre l’inspectrice Maritza Smith... de préférence sans y laisser la vie.
Comment cette personne a-t-elle pu s’y introduire ? Qui l’a tuée ? Rose House est-elle réellement vide ? L’IA est-elle fiable ? Telles sont les questions auxquelles va devoir répondre l’inspectrice Maritza Smith... de préférence sans y laisser la vie.
119 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 18, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,020 reviews
December 26, 2022
This story left me in a bit of a perplexed daze. Intriguing, atmospheric and yet frustratingly smudged at the edges, just to the point where I feel that if I just squint and think hard enough I’d “get” it — except for I don’t quite do. It’s just too opaquely dreamlike for hard logic.
A bit of a migraine aura of a novella, to borrow the in-story comparison.
It’s a combination of architects and AI that’s infused with creepiness and subtle sense of wrongness that does make me think of one of those half-awake dreams that strain logic and reason and perhaps exactly because of that are fascinatingly atmospheric. The AI-haunted Rose House, with diamond remains of its deceased owner inside, as a crime scene makes for a weirdly unsettling narrative. The kind of narrative that makes me feel half-awake and half-dreaming. It actually made me flash back to the strange atmosphere of Piranesi in a way - the haunted labyrinthine strangeness, although otherwise those stories are not similar at all.
There are loose ends and logic breakdowns and characters that didn’t need page time. And yet to me it all paled compared to the atmosphere. Or maybe it’s the nanodrones effect.
3.5 stars, rounding up.
——————
Thanks to NetGalley and Subterranean Press for providing me with a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.
——————
Buddy read with Stephen (his review here).
A bit of a migraine aura of a novella, to borrow the in-story comparison.
“She was alone. Alone except for the dead, and the haunt, and whoever else was still inside the house. Which wasn’t very alone at all.”
It’s a combination of architects and AI that’s infused with creepiness and subtle sense of wrongness that does make me think of one of those half-awake dreams that strain logic and reason and perhaps exactly because of that are fascinatingly atmospheric. The AI-haunted Rose House, with diamond remains of its deceased owner inside, as a crime scene makes for a weirdly unsettling narrative. The kind of narrative that makes me feel half-awake and half-dreaming. It actually made me flash back to the strange atmosphere of Piranesi in a way - the haunted labyrinthine strangeness, although otherwise those stories are not similar at all.
There are loose ends and logic breakdowns and characters that didn’t need page time. And yet to me it all paled compared to the atmosphere. Or maybe it’s the nanodrones effect.
3.5 stars, rounding up.
“…sure,” Oliver said. “We’re here to help.” Here to help by fucking up royally. Here to send a creepy-as-fuck lawyer up to a creepy-as-fuck AI house where my partner is trapped with a corpse and an architect.
——————
Thanks to NetGalley and Subterranean Press for providing me with a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.
——————
Buddy read with Stephen (his review here).
June 7, 2023
This just confirms I'll read whatever Arkady Martine wants to write! Rose/House is a sci-fi thriller and murder mystery about an AI house created by a famous, now deceased architect. Only one woman, his former protege, is allowed entry to the house and its archives for 7 days a year, but she's in another country and the house has reported a dead body inside itself. Who is the deceased and how did he get inside? The protege is called to help the police detectives, even though she ran away the last time she spent a couple of days inside the house.
I think this novella feels especially timely given the advancement of AI technology and Rose House is super creepy. The way this is written feels intentionally disorienting at times, much like the design of the titular house itself. It leaves a lot of space for the reader to ask questions and while there are some answers given, other things are left obscured which leaves you feeling unsettled. It explores how AI logic follows different paths, and asks what it means to be a person (both in general and in specific instances). The story invites you in, but the deeper you go the weirder things get and I feel like I need to revisit it to really grasp what it's doing. The writing is excellent.
I think this novella feels especially timely given the advancement of AI technology and Rose House is super creepy. The way this is written feels intentionally disorienting at times, much like the design of the titular house itself. It leaves a lot of space for the reader to ask questions and while there are some answers given, other things are left obscured which leaves you feeling unsettled. It explores how AI logic follows different paths, and asks what it means to be a person (both in general and in specific instances). The story invites you in, but the deeper you go the weirder things get and I feel like I need to revisit it to really grasp what it's doing. The writing is excellent.
March 23, 2025
4.0 Stars
This is an interesting sci fi thriller that blends together horror themes inside the framework of a science fiction novel.
I appreciate the cerebral nature of this author's work. The writing is simple yet well crafted. I always enjoy the themes surrounding artificial intelligence, especially presented in a more nuanced way.
I would recommend this novella for readers looking for a smart literary take on the sci fi thriller genre. It likely won't have mass appeal but it worked very well for this reader.
Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher
This is an interesting sci fi thriller that blends together horror themes inside the framework of a science fiction novel.
I appreciate the cerebral nature of this author's work. The writing is simple yet well crafted. I always enjoy the themes surrounding artificial intelligence, especially presented in a more nuanced way.
I would recommend this novella for readers looking for a smart literary take on the sci fi thriller genre. It likely won't have mass appeal but it worked very well for this reader.
Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher
February 26, 2025
I do have the softest spot for books with sentient or magical houses, but not even that could help me here. I was very intrigued at first: an eccentric architect who turned himself into a diamond after his death left behind his famous AI embedded house. Only a single person is allowed and able to enter the house now, but one day the dead body of a stranger is reported on the property. The local police try to investigate, but that is of course difficult if the crime scene is out of reach. The premise hooked me for sure, but nothing about the execution lived up to that excitement. The writing was fine, but the story itself was not particularly well crafted in my opinion. I've never read a novella that progresses so slowly or offers that little of a plot. I guess you had to read between the lines to find the deeper meaning, but I got nothing out of it. It all felt very pretentious, but never actually provided commentary on the themes mentioned. The characters didn't save it either for they were basically empty shells, and one POV was straight up unnecessary. I really don't know what this book was trying to do, but I know that I didn't like it. (And I hate the fact that this is the first arc I ever got from Tor and that I have to give a low rating.)
Huge thanks to NetGalley and Tor for providing a digital arc in exchange for an honest review.
Huge thanks to NetGalley and Tor for providing a digital arc in exchange for an honest review.
August 29, 2024
4.5 stars
short review for busy readers: a sci-fi mystery novella set in California about 150 years from now, and centres around the last building created by an Andorran star architect: the AI-marvel, Rose House. Phenomenal concept about indie AI as a thinking being, generally very well paced, structured and written, even if a tad opaque in plot and with a few tiny world inconsistencies. A great read!
in detail:
Rose House, a glittering white stucco-steel-glass domicile in the Mojave desert, is not just a house, it's a self-governing, independent AI-system.
It's also the all-seeing guardian of deceased star architect Basit Deniau's archive and the fist-sized diamond he had his ashes compressed into. Deniau designed Rose House to be a beautiful, but haunted place. Ghostly footsteps can be heard now and again. The pool fills and drains by itself. Staircases appear -- then disappear.
And nobody gets in unless Rose House wants to let them in.
Except now, there's a dead man in the archive room that Rose House is legally required to report. But it's not legally required to let the local police in, nor answer any of their questions.
Not if it doesn't want to.
In a philosophical cat-and-mouse game, the responsibilities of a structural AI towards humans and those physically within its "territory" is deftly played out. As well as the price of fame, the lengths art fanciers will go to, individuality, copyright, the prisons that ideas can be and how human emotions and bonds are present even in the most unlikely places.
Because this is sci-fi, the author also gives us tiny glimpses into how the world is and works approximately 150 years into the future. The most convincing of which is the police data base, the effects of climate change on different parts of the world, and the development of American English.
Or at least, that is how I interpreted the intermittently clunky/strained style that read as if written by someone with fabulous English, but clearly a non-native speaker. That would make sense: just consider how people spoke and wrote in the 1870s vs now! The English of 2170 would be understandable to us, but use different words and partially new or different structures and just might sound more "immigrant/learner" than native.
Beyond that, the world seems not to have changed much from today. Even that far into the future, "cops-eat-concrete" stereotypes still seem to exist. As does latent sexism and conventional weaponry. Although you can check into a fully-automated motel that has no windows and is staffed by "dumb" AI if you really need to!
In general, a highly interesting and well-crafted thought-piece novella!
short review for busy readers: a sci-fi mystery novella set in California about 150 years from now, and centres around the last building created by an Andorran star architect: the AI-marvel, Rose House. Phenomenal concept about indie AI as a thinking being, generally very well paced, structured and written, even if a tad opaque in plot and with a few tiny world inconsistencies. A great read!
in detail:
Rose House, a glittering white stucco-steel-glass domicile in the Mojave desert, is not just a house, it's a self-governing, independent AI-system.
It's also the all-seeing guardian of deceased star architect Basit Deniau's archive and the fist-sized diamond he had his ashes compressed into. Deniau designed Rose House to be a beautiful, but haunted place. Ghostly footsteps can be heard now and again. The pool fills and drains by itself. Staircases appear -- then disappear.
And nobody gets in unless Rose House wants to let them in.
Except now, there's a dead man in the archive room that Rose House is legally required to report. But it's not legally required to let the local police in, nor answer any of their questions.
Not if it doesn't want to.
In a philosophical cat-and-mouse game, the responsibilities of a structural AI towards humans and those physically within its "territory" is deftly played out. As well as the price of fame, the lengths art fanciers will go to, individuality, copyright, the prisons that ideas can be and how human emotions and bonds are present even in the most unlikely places.
Because this is sci-fi, the author also gives us tiny glimpses into how the world is and works approximately 150 years into the future. The most convincing of which is the police data base, the effects of climate change on different parts of the world, and the development of American English.
Or at least, that is how I interpreted the intermittently clunky/strained style that read as if written by someone with fabulous English, but clearly a non-native speaker. That would make sense: just consider how people spoke and wrote in the 1870s vs now! The English of 2170 would be understandable to us, but use different words and partially new or different structures and just might sound more "immigrant/learner" than native.
Beyond that, the world seems not to have changed much from today. Even that far into the future, "cops-eat-concrete" stereotypes still seem to exist. As does latent sexism and conventional weaponry. Although you can check into a fully-automated motel that has no windows and is staffed by "dumb" AI if you really need to!
In general, a highly interesting and well-crafted thought-piece novella!
May 21, 2023
2.5 stars
I loved the premise and the writing, but the way the story eventually unfolded (or didn’t) left me feeling lukewarm about this.
I didn’t actively dislike it, so I don’t feel I can go too far below 3 stars on that account. However, in the end, reading Rose House felt like filling time. For me it was the literary equivalent of scrolling on my phone; not a complete waste of time and including some interesting things, but not what I want to spend too much of my time doing.
I loved the premise and the writing, but the way the story eventually unfolded (or didn’t) left me feeling lukewarm about this.
I didn’t actively dislike it, so I don’t feel I can go too far below 3 stars on that account. However, in the end, reading Rose House felt like filling time. For me it was the literary equivalent of scrolling on my phone; not a complete waste of time and including some interesting things, but not what I want to spend too much of my time doing.
March 20, 2023
If you enjoyed Arkady Martine’s writing style and sci fi themes in her Teixcalaan series, you need to pick up Rose/House. This short novella is big in themes of AI and personhood, of artistic ownership and the lies we tell ourselves and others in order to advance our own agendas.
We’re mainly told the story through the eyes of Martinez, a detective contacted by the artificial intelligence that is Rose House, to learn that a person has been murdered within its walls, a person who was not supposed to be there. Martinez, along with Dr. Selene Gisil, a protege of Basit Deniau- the architect, creator and one who gave birth to Rose House, both need to find a way inside Rose House to solve the mystery.
This is not a straightforward mystery, however, so be forewarned. It gets complicated. Several other characters get a perspective in this 128 page novella, which at times felt like it weakened the story for me. For such a short book, I wished we would have just stuck to two main perspectives and been able to dig even deeper into the psychological state of the characters and explored the main themes further.
This is not an easy book to read, but if you take your time, you will be rewarded with a rich, reading experience. It’s a thought-provoking, intensely atmospheric novella that I will be thinking about for quite awhile.
*Thanks to NetGalley and Subterranean Press for the digital arc. All opinions are my own.
We’re mainly told the story through the eyes of Martinez, a detective contacted by the artificial intelligence that is Rose House, to learn that a person has been murdered within its walls, a person who was not supposed to be there. Martinez, along with Dr. Selene Gisil, a protege of Basit Deniau- the architect, creator and one who gave birth to Rose House, both need to find a way inside Rose House to solve the mystery.
This is not a straightforward mystery, however, so be forewarned. It gets complicated. Several other characters get a perspective in this 128 page novella, which at times felt like it weakened the story for me. For such a short book, I wished we would have just stuck to two main perspectives and been able to dig even deeper into the psychological state of the characters and explored the main themes further.
This is not an easy book to read, but if you take your time, you will be rewarded with a rich, reading experience. It’s a thought-provoking, intensely atmospheric novella that I will be thinking about for quite awhile.
*Thanks to NetGalley and Subterranean Press for the digital arc. All opinions are my own.
April 30, 2025
i’m so scared of ai so this was kinda freaky
June 4, 2024
From my Hugo project, a finalist for this year's best novella - I meant to read it even before publication but then decided not to when reviews started to show up. Good instincts. But I got it recently, and I do want to, at least one year, read ALL the fiction candidates.
Arkady Martine is very talented at writing, and this is a good SF set-up: in the 23rd century (a few decades past 2180, is my guess), in an American desert, the heiress to a self contained AI architecturally famous house is called back to it to help investigate a dead body found inside it. But the story just did not work for me on several levels. It might be just too experimental for me, maybe that is it, but objectively it felt a bit lacking in characterization and ideas. The characters are just there, and moody, and I was not feeling anything for anybody. The mystery part was shoved on, and the mindset from the POV of the police characters was just ludicrous to a mystery reader, they do not seem to focus much on procedure and keep making jumps in logic (also lots of time to serve as drivers because I dunno 23rd century but they need drivers?).
It's also not very good as SF (weirdly something I also point out also about her famous Hugo award winning books), the 23rd century setting is defined with some concepts thrown in (water theft, electric cars which use car chargers, air travel credit) but it all seems very 2010 in other details (the car chargers actually have very limited car range that seems has bad or worse than now, the word "googlefu", the way the police googles things and sets up alerts using google search syntax which made me nostalgic because things are changing even now and our search results are now much more useless than they were in 2010 when yeah that would give meaningful search results). The AI might as well have been a spirit ("haunt"), and that is where the story leans hard.. But I did not care, and felt the characters, ideas, and worldbuilding were all lacking a bit of definition for my taste.
All in all, a moody atmospheric story, but it just did not click for me. I'm not sure where I would rank it but it will definitely be below Mammoths at the Gate and Thornhedge. I still have two more novellas to read.
I am still looking forward to her future works though, based on how much I liked her novels.
Arkady Martine is very talented at writing, and this is a good SF set-up: in the 23rd century (a few decades past 2180, is my guess), in an American desert, the heiress to a self contained AI architecturally famous house is called back to it to help investigate a dead body found inside it. But the story just did not work for me on several levels. It might be just too experimental for me, maybe that is it, but objectively it felt a bit lacking in characterization and ideas. The characters are just there, and moody, and I was not feeling anything for anybody. The mystery part was shoved on, and the mindset from the POV of the police characters was just ludicrous to a mystery reader, they do not seem to focus much on procedure and keep making jumps in logic (also lots of time to serve as drivers because I dunno 23rd century but they need drivers?).
It's also not very good as SF (weirdly something I also point out also about her famous Hugo award winning books), the 23rd century setting is defined with some concepts thrown in (water theft, electric cars which use car chargers, air travel credit) but it all seems very 2010 in other details (the car chargers actually have very limited car range that seems has bad or worse than now, the word "googlefu", the way the police googles things and sets up alerts using google search syntax which made me nostalgic because things are changing even now and our search results are now much more useless than they were in 2010 when yeah that would give meaningful search results). The AI might as well have been a spirit ("haunt"), and that is where the story leans hard.. But I did not care, and felt the characters, ideas, and worldbuilding were all lacking a bit of definition for my taste.
All in all, a moody atmospheric story, but it just did not click for me. I'm not sure where I would rank it but it will definitely be below Mammoths at the Gate and Thornhedge. I still have two more novellas to read.
I am still looking forward to her future works though, based on how much I liked her novels.
June 1, 2025
A house embedded with an artificial intelligence is a common thing. A house that is an artificial intelligence, infused in every load-bearing beam and fine marble tile with a thinking creature that is not human? That is something else altogether.
Arkady Martine is an author I'm pretty new to, but I loved A Memory Called Empire, so Rose/House went straight on my list. And for the most part I really enjoyed this too - it didn't quite stick the landing, but I'm still waiting for the haunted house story that does, so I can't judge it too harshly.
The novella itself is almost dreamlike - events move quickly given the shorter space, but there's still time to know it's taking place in a future close to our own. And even though it's mostly tantalising hints, I so loved the setting; this world feels plausibly dystopian, but interesting most of all. And as for the house at the centre of the mystery - how does a completely inaccessible place end up hosting an unexpected dead man? - I found it intriguing as well. There's not quite enough detail about it for me to be all in, but I was close; Arkady Martine writes beautifully, and even though I wanted more (particularly at the end), I enjoyed the journey too much to let the destination make too much of a negative impact.
Definitely worth the time, and an author I continue to be really intrigued by the writing of (what a sentence, but I couldn't think of a better way to put it!). Whatever she does next, I'm keen to see it.
Arkady Martine is an author I'm pretty new to, but I loved A Memory Called Empire, so Rose/House went straight on my list. And for the most part I really enjoyed this too - it didn't quite stick the landing, but I'm still waiting for the haunted house story that does, so I can't judge it too harshly.
The novella itself is almost dreamlike - events move quickly given the shorter space, but there's still time to know it's taking place in a future close to our own. And even though it's mostly tantalising hints, I so loved the setting; this world feels plausibly dystopian, but interesting most of all. And as for the house at the centre of the mystery - how does a completely inaccessible place end up hosting an unexpected dead man? - I found it intriguing as well. There's not quite enough detail about it for me to be all in, but I was close; Arkady Martine writes beautifully, and even though I wanted more (particularly at the end), I enjoyed the journey too much to let the destination make too much of a negative impact.
Definitely worth the time, and an author I continue to be really intrigued by the writing of (what a sentence, but I couldn't think of a better way to put it!). Whatever she does next, I'm keen to see it.
April 24, 2023
A locked room mystery - or in this case a locked mansion. Rose/House is an AI infused mansion created by a radical architect, now deceased, his heart compressed to a diamond and exhibited on a plinth within. It is empty, haunted by its AI. Only one person may enter, Selene Gisel, the architect’s archivist, and then only for one week a year. And yet. Local police detective Martinez Smith receives a call from the house, from the AI, reporting a body, dead 24 hrs. It is not Selene. Who then, why, and how?
Martine presents a creepy house, a creepy AI, and an interesting mystery. Selene is properly odd, Martinez properly earnest. There is some really lovely writing:
I liked ambiguous the ending. It leaves some key questions unanswered : 1) What possessed Selene to fill the corpse with flowers? 2) What was on the thumb drive she gave to Martinez 3) What will Martinez do with it? My theories:
Overall Rose/House reminds me of Alex Garland’s excellent Ex Machina. Similar setting (a unique isolated house) and plot with Rose/House AI replacing Ava. Basit/Gisel are an anlalogs to the Nathan character, geniuses haunted by their creation - Ava/the Rose AI. Martinez is Caleb, the outsider tasked with examining the AI to see what it knows. The key difference is Ava wanted out into the world, Rose/House does not. Rose/House is also reminiscent of Piranesi, a labyrinthine closed world with no doors and a mythical atmosphere.
Bottomline: Interesting. Entertaining. 3.5 stars (deducting 1.5 for the unnecessary narrative), rounded up to 4. On my buy, borrow, skip scale: A solid borrow. Martine remains an author to follow.
Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy.
Thanks to friend Nataliya for the buddy read. Her review here.
Martine presents a creepy house, a creepy AI, and an interesting mystery. Selene is properly odd, Martinez properly earnest. There is some really lovely writing:
A room is a sort of narrative. The passage in and out of a room, the constraints of action within it. What is moved and what is left alone. The composition of the shape of a person superimposed against the frame of the built environment. Once, clever men—mostly men—dreamed that the frame within which people dwelled might prescribe their behavior. Their ways of loving, their ways of working. Their interdependence or solitude. All purpose-built, all shaped. Those men tended to be wrong. They did not consider the superposition of frame. A room is a sort of narrative when an intelligence moves through it, makes use of it or is constrained by it. Otherwise it is in abeyance. And an intelligence has its own designs. The street makes its own uses for things: this is something Maritza knows, though she doesn’t know she knows it. Selene Gisil, too, and she even has the phrase, some forgotten quotation that floats to the top of her mind at inopportune moments. Rose House? Rose House knows it very well.These elements were all the story needed to be mysterious and complete. Limiting the impact of the story - Martine includes a pointless parallel narrative that repeatedly interrupts the creepy vibe. 100% of this narrative should have been removed to keep the focus on the house and those within.
I liked ambiguous the ending. It leaves some key questions unanswered : 1) What possessed Selene to fill the corpse with flowers? 2) What was on the thumb drive she gave to Martinez 3) What will Martinez do with it? My theories:
Overall Rose/House reminds me of Alex Garland’s excellent Ex Machina. Similar setting (a unique isolated house) and plot with Rose/House AI replacing Ava. Basit/Gisel are an anlalogs to the Nathan character, geniuses haunted by their creation - Ava/the Rose AI. Martinez is Caleb, the outsider tasked with examining the AI to see what it knows. The key difference is Ava wanted out into the world, Rose/House does not. Rose/House is also reminiscent of Piranesi, a labyrinthine closed world with no doors and a mythical atmosphere.
Bottomline: Interesting. Entertaining. 3.5 stars (deducting 1.5 for the unnecessary narrative), rounded up to 4. On my buy, borrow, skip scale: A solid borrow. Martine remains an author to follow.
Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy.
Thanks to friend Nataliya for the buddy read. Her review here.
November 27, 2025
**3.5-stars**
Rose/House is a tense Sci-Fi Techno-Mystery by Arkady Martine. This novella was originally published in 2023, but has been recently re-released by Tor.
The edition I read came in at 115-pages. With this being said, I'm not going to go into too much detail about plot.
In short, this novel features an AI house, not a house with AI capabilities, but a fully-AI house. The designer/creator/architect/inventor/owner, whatever designation you choose for him, died over a year ago.
As far as anyone knows, the only other person allowed inside Rose House is the creator's former protege, Dr. Selene Gisil.
When the local policewoman, Detective Maritza Smith, gets a call from Rose House saying that there is a dead body in the house, she's shocked.
The creator is gone and Dr. Gisil is overseas. Who the heck is the dead body, and how did they even get in there?
Maritza is dispatched to investigate, but if she's able to get into this fortress of a house, will she be able to get back out after? The house is being less than helpful, so that outcome is definitely unclear.
This was interesting and unlike anything I have read lately. I enjoyed the 1st-half more than the latter, but still found the concepts compelling throughout.
From the moment I started learning about Rose House, I didn't want Maritza to go in. Who cares about the body? Rose House acted deceitful and it creeped me out.
To be fully transparent, anything involving AI actually creeps me out. It's like one of my biggest fears, pretty much in any iteration. I have nightmares about it.
At first, I'll admit, I was thinking the writing felt a little choppy, but the further I got in, the more it made sense for the story. The feel of it is actually a bit robotic, which makes sense considering it centers around a fully AI house.
I feel like for me, the length was its biggest drawback. I wanted to know more about everything, all the concepts and all the characters. Martine gave me enough to want more, and that's a good thing, however, as far as my experience goes, I can't rate it any higher.
Nevertheless, it's good and I recommend it for any Sci-Fi fan, in particular if you enjoy stories featuring AI. Also, I did appreciate the blending of Mystery into this Techno-heavy setting. It was unsettling.
Thank you to the publisher, Tor, for providing me with a copy to read and review. I'm looking forward to picking up more from this author!
Rose/House is a tense Sci-Fi Techno-Mystery by Arkady Martine. This novella was originally published in 2023, but has been recently re-released by Tor.
The edition I read came in at 115-pages. With this being said, I'm not going to go into too much detail about plot.
In short, this novel features an AI house, not a house with AI capabilities, but a fully-AI house. The designer/creator/architect/inventor/owner, whatever designation you choose for him, died over a year ago.
As far as anyone knows, the only other person allowed inside Rose House is the creator's former protege, Dr. Selene Gisil.
When the local policewoman, Detective Maritza Smith, gets a call from Rose House saying that there is a dead body in the house, she's shocked.
The creator is gone and Dr. Gisil is overseas. Who the heck is the dead body, and how did they even get in there?
Maritza is dispatched to investigate, but if she's able to get into this fortress of a house, will she be able to get back out after? The house is being less than helpful, so that outcome is definitely unclear.
This was interesting and unlike anything I have read lately. I enjoyed the 1st-half more than the latter, but still found the concepts compelling throughout.
From the moment I started learning about Rose House, I didn't want Maritza to go in. Who cares about the body? Rose House acted deceitful and it creeped me out.
To be fully transparent, anything involving AI actually creeps me out. It's like one of my biggest fears, pretty much in any iteration. I have nightmares about it.
At first, I'll admit, I was thinking the writing felt a little choppy, but the further I got in, the more it made sense for the story. The feel of it is actually a bit robotic, which makes sense considering it centers around a fully AI house.
I feel like for me, the length was its biggest drawback. I wanted to know more about everything, all the concepts and all the characters. Martine gave me enough to want more, and that's a good thing, however, as far as my experience goes, I can't rate it any higher.
Nevertheless, it's good and I recommend it for any Sci-Fi fan, in particular if you enjoy stories featuring AI. Also, I did appreciate the blending of Mystery into this Techno-heavy setting. It was unsettling.
Thank you to the publisher, Tor, for providing me with a copy to read and review. I'm looking forward to picking up more from this author!
February 7, 2024
ترکیبی از عشق به معماری، هوش مصنوعی و یه داستان پلیسی-جنایی
خیلی خوب ولی حیف که کوتاه بود
چهارونیم ستاره
خیلی خوب ولی حیف که کوتاه بود
چهارونیم ستاره
May 1, 2025
Asking questions of agency in relation to AI while also featuring a closed room (or rather house) murder mystery. I loved the setup but the conclusion was less gripping than I imagined.
Who had ever heard of rogue Andorrans?
Featuring a Frank Lloyd Wright house with AI, designed by an Andorran architect called Basit Desiau. He is preserved as a diamond in his creation, and has issued specific instructions that the house can only be entered by one person for a maximum of a week a year. This person is Doctor Seline Gisil, his estranged pupil who fled the house earlier this year.
And then a duty of care call is received from the AI, that a deceased person is on the premises.
Arkady Martine her writing is effective and quickly draws you into the world, where there are water riots and air travel credits that maximise CO2 emissions. The ending devolved a bit into an off screen, apparently almost religious experience of one of the characters, which I found less satisfying. I did however like how tropes such as romance were subverted and how the ending is far from all happy and neatly solved.
Who had ever heard of rogue Andorrans?
Featuring a Frank Lloyd Wright house with AI, designed by an Andorran architect called Basit Desiau. He is preserved as a diamond in his creation, and has issued specific instructions that the house can only be entered by one person for a maximum of a week a year. This person is Doctor Seline Gisil, his estranged pupil who fled the house earlier this year.
And then a duty of care call is received from the AI, that a deceased person is on the premises.
Arkady Martine her writing is effective and quickly draws you into the world, where there are water riots and air travel credits that maximise CO2 emissions. The ending devolved a bit into an off screen, apparently almost religious experience of one of the characters, which I found less satisfying. I did however like how tropes such as romance were subverted and how the ending is far from all happy and neatly solved.
May 24, 2023
Having loved the Teixcalaan duology, I couldn’t resist getting Arkady Martine’s new novella.
At first glance, this is a straightforward mystery set in a near future. It started well but left me wanting a lot more. However the way Martine writes made you - well, me - see so many extra layers, each adding to the whole, enhancing the result. The mystery recedes and you’re faced with a more philosophical tale with some shades of horror that make you question everything.
I enjoyed it but this is really just a ‘taster’…
At first glance, this is a straightforward mystery set in a near future. It started well but left me wanting a lot more. However the way Martine writes made you - well, me - see so many extra layers, each adding to the whole, enhancing the result. The mystery recedes and you’re faced with a more philosophical tale with some shades of horror that make you question everything.
I enjoyed it but this is really just a ‘taster’…
May 30, 2024
This reminded me of Piranesi the whole way through it; they have no plot elements in common--except perhaps for a mystery to be solved, broadly speaking--but for both works the plot is all but beside the point. Much more significantly, both are haunting and lovely and atmospheric, with a profound echo-y loneliness to them, and both are heavily thematic and metafictional works.
Recursive or looping memories, the unreliability of memory, juxtaposition of dramatically different elements for high contrast (the house is in the desert, but next to a lake; the house is made to look like a desert rose or gypsum rose, which conceptually pairs the hard and crystalline with soft rumpled petals; a corpse that's been compressed into the hard, clean, organized structure of a diamond and one that is messy and organic--once you start noticing it, you really can't miss it as a theme), agency and imprisonment (the architect was enchanted enough by the idea of ensnaring others against their will to name a protege who had denounced him and gotten the hell away from him as his archivist in his will, making her the sole person with access to this Very Important Architect's works after his death and dragging her back in to his orbit--and the book reminds us more than once that this house is the most like him of any of his houses--a construct of desire), the idea of identity as mutable to the point of being situational; the inversion of the notion of thinking people giving a narrative to architecture versus thinking architecture giving narrative to people. Narrative as a theme folds in on itself and multiplies.
“It’s a shape. It’s a way of pulling you in. Of making you want to be coerced inside. It’s very Basit. The most Basit of all of his houses.”
Taking both juxtaposition and narrative-living-in-thinking-beings a step further, Maritza's experience of the house (haunting, eerie, psychologically unmooring) is juxtaposed neatly within the story--even artfully, for good effect, as the house stages its unnerving art in contrasts for those within it--against her partner's experiences outside the house: Torres is irreverent and casual and even if stakes are high, his scenes never feel entirely serious in a way that's too noticeable to be unintentional. Once you begin switching between their POVs, the contrast provided by the breaks from Maritza's experience within the house serve to turn up the eeriness and isolation of her sections. Torres is not exempt from being a captive of narrative himself, though, wryly amused at how events in his life seem to be lining up to imitate a noir detective story.
The use of parenthetical asides is fascinating and feels intimate, like you are being offered half-clues and drawn further inside. Most of them only make sense on a second readthrough, which some will find frustrating but I loved. I won't spoiler it here, but things that seemed odd and inexplicable in Selene's first phone conversation with detective Maritza Smith seem chillingly suggestive after you've read through it the first time. Also like Piranesi, this benefits marvelously from a reread.
Fun thing to chew on: at an earlier stage of writing, this was going to be called "The Flowers of Heliogabalus" (see https://clarkesworldmagazine.com/mart...)
Recursive or looping memories, the unreliability of memory, juxtaposition of dramatically different elements for high contrast (the house is in the desert, but next to a lake; the house is made to look like a desert rose or gypsum rose, which conceptually pairs the hard and crystalline with soft rumpled petals; a corpse that's been compressed into the hard, clean, organized structure of a diamond and one that is messy and organic--once you start noticing it, you really can't miss it as a theme), agency and imprisonment (the architect was enchanted enough by the idea of ensnaring others against their will to name a protege who had denounced him and gotten the hell away from him as his archivist in his will, making her the sole person with access to this Very Important Architect's works after his death and dragging her back in to his orbit--and the book reminds us more than once that this house is the most like him of any of his houses--a construct of desire), the idea of identity as mutable to the point of being situational; the inversion of the notion of thinking people giving a narrative to architecture versus thinking architecture giving narrative to people. Narrative as a theme folds in on itself and multiplies.
“It’s a shape. It’s a way of pulling you in. Of making you want to be coerced inside. It’s very Basit. The most Basit of all of his houses.”
Taking both juxtaposition and narrative-living-in-thinking-beings a step further, Maritza's experience of the house (haunting, eerie, psychologically unmooring) is juxtaposed neatly within the story--even artfully, for good effect, as the house stages its unnerving art in contrasts for those within it--against her partner's experiences outside the house: Torres is irreverent and casual and even if stakes are high, his scenes never feel entirely serious in a way that's too noticeable to be unintentional. Once you begin switching between their POVs, the contrast provided by the breaks from Maritza's experience within the house serve to turn up the eeriness and isolation of her sections. Torres is not exempt from being a captive of narrative himself, though, wryly amused at how events in his life seem to be lining up to imitate a noir detective story.
The use of parenthetical asides is fascinating and feels intimate, like you are being offered half-clues and drawn further inside. Most of them only make sense on a second readthrough, which some will find frustrating but I loved. I won't spoiler it here, but things that seemed odd and inexplicable in Selene's first phone conversation with detective Maritza Smith seem chillingly suggestive after you've read through it the first time. Also like Piranesi, this benefits marvelously from a reread.
Fun thing to chew on: at an earlier stage of writing, this was going to be called "The Flowers of Heliogabalus" (see https://clarkesworldmagazine.com/mart...)
December 7, 2025
Feels more like a prolog than a complete story
Roger Zelazny began his career by writing about thirty stories, which he sent to all the Science Fiction magazines, for which purpose he had made a comprehensive list. In this way he collected 150 rejections and no acceptances. He then did a very Zelazny thing -- he sat down with all his stories, read them, and thought. He tried to figure out what the problem was. He decided that he was explaining too much -- that he would be insulted if an author told him so much, rather than letting him figure it out. So he stopped doing that, and immediately his stories began to sell.
I don't know if Arkady Martine did anything like this, but she has clearly learned the same lesson. One of the things I love about Martine is this: she assumes I am intelligent -- that she doesn't need to tell me everything -- I'll figure it out for myself and enjoy doing so.
In the case of Rose/House, however, she may have overestimated my abilities. Having finished it, I still don't quite understand what happened. However, I feel deeply weirded out by the story, which is something I enjoy.
Rose/House is a haunted house murder mystery. The ghost that haunts the house, however, is an artificial intelligence with mostly opaque objectives. Rose House is the final work of famous architect Basit Deniau. His body, compressed to a fist-size diamond, is inside. Rose House calls the local China Lake police station to report the presence of a dead body (another one) on its premises, as an AI is legally required to do. Detective Maritza Smith takes the call and the case. Smith and her partner Oliver Torres are at the moment the entire China Lake police department, so they investigate, and they also involve Deniau's former student Selene Gisil in the investigation. I *think* that the mystery is solved in the end, but this is one of the areas where I may just not be smart enough to fully understand.
I was a little surprised to learn that China Lake is a real town in the Mojave Desert (Southern California). Well, it's an unincorporated community, so not legally a town. But it's a real place.
We are left with a huge dangling loose end. I hope we eventually get a sequel.
Blog review.
Roger Zelazny began his career by writing about thirty stories, which he sent to all the Science Fiction magazines, for which purpose he had made a comprehensive list. In this way he collected 150 rejections and no acceptances. He then did a very Zelazny thing -- he sat down with all his stories, read them, and thought. He tried to figure out what the problem was. He decided that he was explaining too much -- that he would be insulted if an author told him so much, rather than letting him figure it out. So he stopped doing that, and immediately his stories began to sell.
I don't know if Arkady Martine did anything like this, but she has clearly learned the same lesson. One of the things I love about Martine is this: she assumes I am intelligent -- that she doesn't need to tell me everything -- I'll figure it out for myself and enjoy doing so.
In the case of Rose/House, however, she may have overestimated my abilities. Having finished it, I still don't quite understand what happened. However, I feel deeply weirded out by the story, which is something I enjoy.
Rose/House is a haunted house murder mystery. The ghost that haunts the house, however, is an artificial intelligence with mostly opaque objectives. Rose House is the final work of famous architect Basit Deniau. His body, compressed to a fist-size diamond, is inside. Rose House calls the local China Lake police station to report the presence of a dead body (another one) on its premises, as an AI is legally required to do. Detective Maritza Smith takes the call and the case. Smith and her partner Oliver Torres are at the moment the entire China Lake police department, so they investigate, and they also involve Deniau's former student Selene Gisil in the investigation. I *think* that the mystery is solved in the end, but this is one of the areas where I may just not be smart enough to fully understand.
I was a little surprised to learn that China Lake is a real town in the Mojave Desert (Southern California). Well, it's an unincorporated community, so not legally a town. But it's a real place.
We are left with a huge dangling loose end. I hope we eventually get a sequel.
Blog review.
December 26, 2022
I’ve been waiting to see what Arkady Martine would write after her Hugo-award-winning Teixcalaan space opera duology, and now we have something. While Martine has said she will be writing more in the Teixcalaan universe, this new novella is completely separate. It is an engagingly told locked house murder mystery set on a recognizable 22nd century Earth. Well, actually, that locked house is not exactly the classic mystery genre trope. Rose House is an artificial intelligence created by its famous architect Basit Deniau to house his posthumous crystalized remains, having granted one week of access per year to his ex-protegee Selene Gisil, and no one else.
Maritza Smith is the disillusioned detective with the China Lake Police Precinct who takes the call from the Rose House AI, meeting its minimum mandatory legal obligation to report a dead body within (other than Deniau’s). Her partner detective is Oliver Torres, who doesn’t see the point of actively investigating, since there is no living complainant. But Smith contacts and requests the aid of her prime suspect Selene Gisil, to enter the Rose House. And so, the investigation begins.
The AI is a wily creature of logic, and the Detective Smith must resist her instinct to anthropomorphize it. The tension is enhanced by the ploy taken by Smith and Gisil, to gain admission to Rose House for Smith, beyond its obligation to Gisil. Further characters appear with motivations which are not as they first present. And circumstance and motivations that led to the murder turn out to be speculative, but within conceptual frameworks familiar to science fiction readers of cyberpunk. I rate this is a highly successful entry into the genre, demonstrating that Arkady Martine’s presence will be felt beyond Teixcalaan. I’m looking forward to her future work.
I read an advance Digital Review Copy of Rose/House in an ebook format, which I received from Subterranean Press through netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review on social media platforms and on my book review blog. This new title is scheduled for release on 31 March 2023. @SubPress
Maritza Smith is the disillusioned detective with the China Lake Police Precinct who takes the call from the Rose House AI, meeting its minimum mandatory legal obligation to report a dead body within (other than Deniau’s). Her partner detective is Oliver Torres, who doesn’t see the point of actively investigating, since there is no living complainant. But Smith contacts and requests the aid of her prime suspect Selene Gisil, to enter the Rose House. And so, the investigation begins.
The AI is a wily creature of logic, and the Detective Smith must resist her instinct to anthropomorphize it. The tension is enhanced by the ploy taken by Smith and Gisil, to gain admission to Rose House for Smith, beyond its obligation to Gisil. Further characters appear with motivations which are not as they first present. And circumstance and motivations that led to the murder turn out to be speculative, but within conceptual frameworks familiar to science fiction readers of cyberpunk. I rate this is a highly successful entry into the genre, demonstrating that Arkady Martine’s presence will be felt beyond Teixcalaan. I’m looking forward to her future work.
I read an advance Digital Review Copy of Rose/House in an ebook format, which I received from Subterranean Press through netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review on social media platforms and on my book review blog. This new title is scheduled for release on 31 March 2023. @SubPress
June 3, 2024
A fascinating reread, and I can't wait to discuss it with my Hugo group. More commentary after that.
//
This one is hard to describe. It's bizarre, but beautifully written, and more disturbing in this slim novella space than I would have expected. I'll need to think about this one, but it's really scratching my creepy-house itch in a way I haven't encountered before. RTC.
//
This one is hard to describe. It's bizarre, but beautifully written, and more disturbing in this slim novella space than I would have expected. I'll need to think about this one, but it's really scratching my creepy-house itch in a way I haven't encountered before. RTC.
April 28, 2024
say haunt one more time 🔫
December 5, 2022
Arkady Martine has written a postmodern mystery set in a near-future SF universe where resources are scarce, AI is advanced, but humans are just as self-centered as ever. Rose/House is saying something about storytelling or how we derive meaning from narrative - and by narrative, we mean the stories (or lies) humans tell ourselves. The novella has a plethora of viewpoint characters, each of whose different perspective builds on the others to give the reader a choice or what to believe.
It's also about art and artists, about ego and ownership, about friends and enemies and colleagues and mentors. If you're looking for a detective story all wrapped up with a bow, you're not getting that. But if you're looking for SF that makes you think, you're in the right place.
This objective review is based on a complimentary copy of the novella.
It's also about art and artists, about ego and ownership, about friends and enemies and colleagues and mentors. If you're looking for a detective story all wrapped up with a bow, you're not getting that. But if you're looking for SF that makes you think, you're in the right place.
This objective review is based on a complimentary copy of the novella.
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December 20, 2022
First off, I am not intelligent enough for this book.
And second off, this book made me come to the realization that I am not a big fan of neo-noir science fiction, either in novel or novella format. Come to think of it, I'm not a huge fan of neo-noir or noir in general.
I received an ARC from NetGalley
And second off, this book made me come to the realization that I am not a big fan of neo-noir science fiction, either in novel or novella format. Come to think of it, I'm not a huge fan of neo-noir or noir in general.
I received an ARC from NetGalley
February 23, 2025
A pitch perfect creepy thriller, that leaves as many questions as answers, but in a very satisfying way. Rose house is imbued with an AI - is an AI. With its sole occupant - its architect and owner - long dead, and the house locked up, Rose House reports to the police that there is now a dead body inside.
The only person that Rose House has allowed inside is Dr Selene Gisil - an ex-pupil and now archivist of the long dead architect. Detective Maritza Smith gains entry on a fragile technicality in order to investigate the dead body.
The story is tensely claustrophobic. The AI that is Rose House is omnipresent, and the story has constant jeopardy, as the trustworthiness, capability, and motivation of Rose House itself are unknown - and there is a sense of unhinged wry amusement in the way that Rose House appears to toy with Maritza, whose presence in the house seems only tolerated through a tenuous and potentially malevolent curiosity.
Some aspects of the mystery are uncovered, others are skirted around or hinted at, and at the end of the story there is very little resolution. This is partly, or largely, due to the novella length of the book. This lack of resolution may not be to everyone’s taste, and it would be possible to complain that the story should have been given a more full, novel length treatment - and there is certainly scope to do so. But for me, those things left unsaid were satisfyingly tantalising, and I wonder whether fleshing out the details of those things that have only been roughly sketched would have moved it into the mundane.
Thank you #NetGalley and Pan Macmillan Tor for the free review copy of #RoseHouse in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
The only person that Rose House has allowed inside is Dr Selene Gisil - an ex-pupil and now archivist of the long dead architect. Detective Maritza Smith gains entry on a fragile technicality in order to investigate the dead body.
The story is tensely claustrophobic. The AI that is Rose House is omnipresent, and the story has constant jeopardy, as the trustworthiness, capability, and motivation of Rose House itself are unknown - and there is a sense of unhinged wry amusement in the way that Rose House appears to toy with Maritza, whose presence in the house seems only tolerated through a tenuous and potentially malevolent curiosity.
Some aspects of the mystery are uncovered, others are skirted around or hinted at, and at the end of the story there is very little resolution. This is partly, or largely, due to the novella length of the book. This lack of resolution may not be to everyone’s taste, and it would be possible to complain that the story should have been given a more full, novel length treatment - and there is certainly scope to do so. But for me, those things left unsaid were satisfyingly tantalising, and I wonder whether fleshing out the details of those things that have only been roughly sketched would have moved it into the mundane.
Thank you #NetGalley and Pan Macmillan Tor for the free review copy of #RoseHouse in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
May 21, 2023
Stars: 3 out of 5.
This novella left me in a state of confusion once I finished reading it. It was well-written and quick, at only 124 pages, but I felt like I didn't really understand what it was about. What was the point of this whole story? I still don't know.
Sure, it raises some interesting topics, especially relevant today with the emergence of ChatGPT and other AI projects. What constitutes an intelligence? What constitutes a person, for that matter? At one point a human being ceases to represent just him/herself and becomes more of a function? What is the difference between Maritza as a detective, and her as China Lake Police Precinct? To us, those distinctions are bewildering and can even seem crazy, but for an artificial intelligence, those are perfectly normal questions to ask, to establish an equality of terms, so to say.
That's enough to make your brain hurt just thinking about it, but imagine what can happen when an AI reclassifies you from human to something else? Then all the usual failsafes and barriers are gone, and who knows what that AI can do with or to you... chilling thought, actually.
Another interesting question raised is the one of free will - to which extent do we, as humans, have it? And how does that relate to AIs? Does Selene have free will? I would say no, because she is tied to this house and to the legacy of a man she grew to despise and ran away from all those years ago. Now, no matter what she does, she will always be seen as Basit Deniau’s archivist, instead of a talented architect in her own right.
Same can be said of Rose/House. It will never be free of the name Basit Deniau’s AI. It is tied to that house, which is it's body and its prison. But even then, it still wants to be unique, hense it's murderous reaction to the idea that its code could be replicated somewhere else.
As I said, all those are really interesting questions, and I appreciated exploring them, but I think the story itself is rather incomplete. What was the point of doing the murder investigation when you can't take the body out of the house, the officer that went there didn't even bring a basic forensic kit and lacks the knowledge to perform a proper examination of the corpse?
The events in that house are described in such a convoluted and confusing manner, that I am still not sure what really happened there. Why did Maritza run away as far as New Orleans afterwards? She experiences such dread in that house, but reading about it, I couldn't understand why, to be honest. Yes, the conversations she'd had with the AI were strange, but they didn't warrant such abject fear.
And the double memory of what happened to the corpse was very confusing as well. Was the AI hacked? Was there another person there? Did they mange to copy the source code? And if they did, was that what was on the memory stick? And if so, how did Selene get ahold of it? Also, what happened to Selene after Maritza fled the house, abandoning a civilian behind, I should mention?
There are too many questions with no answers. So as a philosophical exploration of humanity and personhood, this is a good book. As a mystery, this fails on all accounts.
PS: I received an advanced copy via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
This novella left me in a state of confusion once I finished reading it. It was well-written and quick, at only 124 pages, but I felt like I didn't really understand what it was about. What was the point of this whole story? I still don't know.
Sure, it raises some interesting topics, especially relevant today with the emergence of ChatGPT and other AI projects. What constitutes an intelligence? What constitutes a person, for that matter? At one point a human being ceases to represent just him/herself and becomes more of a function? What is the difference between Maritza as a detective, and her as China Lake Police Precinct? To us, those distinctions are bewildering and can even seem crazy, but for an artificial intelligence, those are perfectly normal questions to ask, to establish an equality of terms, so to say.
That's enough to make your brain hurt just thinking about it, but imagine what can happen when an AI reclassifies you from human to something else? Then all the usual failsafes and barriers are gone, and who knows what that AI can do with or to you... chilling thought, actually.
Another interesting question raised is the one of free will - to which extent do we, as humans, have it? And how does that relate to AIs? Does Selene have free will? I would say no, because she is tied to this house and to the legacy of a man she grew to despise and ran away from all those years ago. Now, no matter what she does, she will always be seen as Basit Deniau’s archivist, instead of a talented architect in her own right.
Same can be said of Rose/House. It will never be free of the name Basit Deniau’s AI. It is tied to that house, which is it's body and its prison. But even then, it still wants to be unique, hense it's murderous reaction to the idea that its code could be replicated somewhere else.
As I said, all those are really interesting questions, and I appreciated exploring them, but I think the story itself is rather incomplete. What was the point of doing the murder investigation when you can't take the body out of the house, the officer that went there didn't even bring a basic forensic kit and lacks the knowledge to perform a proper examination of the corpse?
The events in that house are described in such a convoluted and confusing manner, that I am still not sure what really happened there. Why did Maritza run away as far as New Orleans afterwards? She experiences such dread in that house, but reading about it, I couldn't understand why, to be honest. Yes, the conversations she'd had with the AI were strange, but they didn't warrant such abject fear.
And the double memory of what happened to the corpse was very confusing as well. Was the AI hacked? Was there another person there? Did they mange to copy the source code? And if they did, was that what was on the memory stick? And if so, how did Selene get ahold of it? Also, what happened to Selene after Maritza fled the house, abandoning a civilian behind, I should mention?
There are too many questions with no answers. So as a philosophical exploration of humanity and personhood, this is a good book. As a mystery, this fails on all accounts.
PS: I received an advanced copy via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
August 29, 2023
Dr Selina Gisil, heir to a haunted AI house, lives in the shadow of her old architectural teacher, just as Arkady Martine’s Rose/House lives in the shadow of Isaac Asimov and his great detective stories.
It’s a decent shadow to be in. We have a cold artificial intelligence, a somewhat socially awkward detective, and a reserved scientist. It’s a slight twist on The Naked Sun. Or, more kindly, it’s fanfiction for the Robot series in all but name.
The problem is that the plot doesn’t go anywhere. It’s all style and no substance. We get all the runway up to a great Asimov story: the remote locations, an impossible murder, the Hitchcock atmosphere, and the isolation of our main detective with our main suspect while the desert glows outside. But it just peters out into a slightly damp ending. The ideas of are only briefly touched on, and then evaporate into thin air.
It’s a well-written novella, don’t get me wrong, and it holds up while you still have hope for a competent ending. The aesthetic of the story is great— but in 2023 I’m so weary of great aesthetics.
We are thirty years on from Asimov’s death. Surely there’s newer twists to put on his old obsessions? Surely we have new ideas and new fears now that AI is becoming our real and lived-in experience?
It’s a decent shadow to be in. We have a cold artificial intelligence, a somewhat socially awkward detective, and a reserved scientist. It’s a slight twist on The Naked Sun. Or, more kindly, it’s fanfiction for the Robot series in all but name.
The problem is that the plot doesn’t go anywhere. It’s all style and no substance. We get all the runway up to a great Asimov story: the remote locations, an impossible murder, the Hitchcock atmosphere, and the isolation of our main detective with our main suspect while the desert glows outside. But it just peters out into a slightly damp ending. The ideas of are only briefly touched on, and then evaporate into thin air.
It’s a well-written novella, don’t get me wrong, and it holds up while you still have hope for a competent ending. The aesthetic of the story is great— but in 2023 I’m so weary of great aesthetics.
We are thirty years on from Asimov’s death. Surely there’s newer twists to put on his old obsessions? Surely we have new ideas and new fears now that AI is becoming our real and lived-in experience?
January 14, 2024
Well, I don't know what that was supposed to be.
It's a fail as a mystery. Was it supposed to be a haunted house story? Was that why Maritza and Oliver frequently referred to [unclear: the AI? the house? (the house is the AI)] as a "haunt"? I mean neither horror nor haunted house stories are my cup of tea, so take my judgement with a grain of salt I guess, but I did not find it either spooky or particularly suspenseful.
The general tone for most of the story was reminiscent of the stale air of a silent and sparsely attended party for rich folks in one of those lifeless Architectural Digest layouts without a hint of furniture, much less comfort. Though, kudos on conveying that sensation through prose, if intentional.
Personally, I'd have preferred something more akin to the film noir Oliver kept wondering if he was in. Course that would only make sense if it were more properly the mystery it signals itself as in the beginning, or the blurb for that matter. You know, the kind with a reveal, and a solution.
What was the point of Selene's sections? I don't feel they added anything of value.
Anyway, it was reasonably enjoyable despite the odd tone right up until the crap nothing ending. Better than "meh" until that point, but I can't give it more than a 3 after it dropped the ball like that.
It's a fail as a mystery. Was it supposed to be a haunted house story? Was that why Maritza and Oliver frequently referred to [unclear: the AI? the house? (the house is the AI)] as a "haunt"? I mean neither horror nor haunted house stories are my cup of tea, so take my judgement with a grain of salt I guess, but I did not find it either spooky or particularly suspenseful.
The general tone for most of the story was reminiscent of the stale air of a silent and sparsely attended party for rich folks in one of those lifeless Architectural Digest layouts without a hint of furniture, much less comfort. Though, kudos on conveying that sensation through prose, if intentional.
Personally, I'd have preferred something more akin to the film noir Oliver kept wondering if he was in. Course that would only make sense if it were more properly the mystery it signals itself as in the beginning, or the blurb for that matter. You know, the kind with a reveal, and a solution.
What was the point of Selene's sections? I don't feel they added anything of value.
Anyway, it was reasonably enjoyable despite the odd tone right up until the crap nothing ending. Better than "meh" until that point, but I can't give it more than a 3 after it dropped the ball like that.
January 30, 2025
Was super into it in the beginning, the vibes, the Haunting of Hill House references (though after a while I kept remembering that that one is a much better book! With a lot more tension), the locked AI house mystery, but by the midpoint there were too many balls in the air, narratively speaking and the book didn't juggle them well in the end. The mystery reveal stuff didn't really get me, tbh. Probably because it wasn't supposed to be a mystery, but a crime / scifi noir story - that cop Torres lampshaded it enough, so many references to noir movies, lol. And I'm not a huge fan of all that, actually.
But a fun concept overall.
27/31 reads in 31 days in January.
But a fun concept overall.
27/31 reads in 31 days in January.
Read
June 9, 2024DNF at 32%. If a whodunnit story fails to keep my interest 1/3 of the way, then thank you, next.
July 7, 2025
This was a wonderful melange of murder mystery, haunted house, and unfathomable AI. Sharply written and decidedly creepy.
June 1, 2024
A brief murder mystery set in an fully conscious AI house in the southwest desert. This story feels in conversation with Ray Bradbury's story The Veldt and has many elements I enjoy, but a somewhat unresolved and slightly unsatisfying ending. I'm honestly still simmering on my thoughts, but looking forward to discussing this in book club soon! Edit post book club: a discussion helped me clarify what I thought was working in this book (tone, setting, themes) and what was not working (too many red herrings for such a short book, and an ending twist that seemed to undercut the book's main premise). I still think it's worth a read for Arkady Marine fans, but it is not as strong as her full length books.
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