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Icon-Violet
At the far reaches of space, Violet has been betrayed by Yellow and left to certain death. Once, they shared a common pool of memories. Now, Yellow has destroyed their bond. And so starts Violet’s perilous journey across the galaxy, whereupon questions of fate will force them to confront mistakes that continue to haunt them both… Find out what happens when one mind is split in two.
258 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 18, 2016
13 people are currently reading
623 people want to read
About the author
Simon Fay
4 books172 followersI'm a science fiction author, but I've also been running a Youtube channel where I talk about books I love. I'm big into Kafka, Murakami, Le Guin, and anything a little bit literary or left of field. Send me cool book recommendations.
Twitter: @simonfayauthor
Check out my Youtube channel: Content Lit
Get my science-fiction book, 'Icon-Violet,' on Amazon
Twitter: @simonfayauthor
Check out my Youtube channel: Content Lit
Get my science-fiction book, 'Icon-Violet,' on Amazon
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
May 21, 2021
Icon-Violet sits apart from the typical sci-fi novel. Missing from its pages are space battles, galactic greed, and exaggerated bravado. Also missing are the countless sequels that rehash the same old sci-fi ingredients. What is included, however, is the real point of science fiction: to explore issues relevant to all of us in a way that removes those issues from the emotional baggage of the near and present. At its core, this is what Simon Fay does with Icon-Violet.
The focus of the novel centers upon an instinctive trait that is as old as our sentience. In the early days of our clan-based existence, the shortcut of defining friend or foe was embedded into our reactionary minds. Simply put, those from the outside were feared. The outsiders were those who were not from within, and the more afar they appeared to be, the greater the fear.
In the intervening millennia, this fear, like most of our ancient instincts, has stayed with us. It has only been through our conscious efforts to employ the greatest of our abilities, rational thought, that we are able to catch ourselves and change. In the absence of rational thought, we see this ancient fear dictating actions that result in the gravest consequences.
Within Icon-Violet, Simon Fay transplants this fear and gives it new circumstances. He explores it through actions and dialogue of his characters, and shows that it can be overcome if we are brave enough to communicate with each other.
This book is very near perfect to my tastes in science fiction. Simon Fay clearly has a grasp of the human condition and wonderfully expresses this grasp though his writing. This is rare ability among science fiction writers. While the book may get a bit too wordy at times, and while I would have liked to see the science side of the novel more defined, this is all trivial considering how much science fiction is held within this si-fi novel.
The focus of the novel centers upon an instinctive trait that is as old as our sentience. In the early days of our clan-based existence, the shortcut of defining friend or foe was embedded into our reactionary minds. Simply put, those from the outside were feared. The outsiders were those who were not from within, and the more afar they appeared to be, the greater the fear.
In the intervening millennia, this fear, like most of our ancient instincts, has stayed with us. It has only been through our conscious efforts to employ the greatest of our abilities, rational thought, that we are able to catch ourselves and change. In the absence of rational thought, we see this ancient fear dictating actions that result in the gravest consequences.
Within Icon-Violet, Simon Fay transplants this fear and gives it new circumstances. He explores it through actions and dialogue of his characters, and shows that it can be overcome if we are brave enough to communicate with each other.
This book is very near perfect to my tastes in science fiction. Simon Fay clearly has a grasp of the human condition and wonderfully expresses this grasp though his writing. This is rare ability among science fiction writers. While the book may get a bit too wordy at times, and while I would have liked to see the science side of the novel more defined, this is all trivial considering how much science fiction is held within this si-fi novel.
May 16, 2019
Icons are vat-grown, synthetic humanoids. A group of six or so icons are called a spectrum. When the icons within a spectrum are in close proximity, they share memories and experiences via a sync.
Two icons are sent on a mission with poorly worded instructions which results in the deaths of some humans. Those same two are sent on another mission, separate from their spectrum and then separate from and at odds with each other.
There were a few points where I found the story confusing (e.g. figuring out which character is speaking/thinking). This is something I also struggled with while reading Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch series.
I enjoyed the exploration of cultures, free will and conformity and the ending truly amazed me with its insight into connections.
Two icons are sent on a mission with poorly worded instructions which results in the deaths of some humans. Those same two are sent on another mission, separate from their spectrum and then separate from and at odds with each other.
There were a few points where I found the story confusing (e.g. figuring out which character is speaking/thinking). This is something I also struggled with while reading Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch series.
I enjoyed the exploration of cultures, free will and conformity and the ending truly amazed me with its insight into connections.
November 26, 2016
Between the ghetto-like existence that humans eke out amidst constant warfare on the home planet, Earth, and the clinically correct, conformist, high-tech civilisation in space, there is a huge, unbridgeable divide of space—and some very heavy security. Enforcing that security falls to the icon spectrums; advanced AIs, able to travel through stretch space with no consequences, and for whose continued psychological stability there is a human observer assigned. When Icon Violet and Icon Yellow are detached from their spectrum to deal with an attempted incursion, for the first time that they remember, they are given full discretion. Do you remember the first time you had to face your own decisions?
The premise of Icon Violet offers a lot of interesting concepts to consider along with the story; with the question of AI and self-determinism, author Simon Fay brings up whether or not an AI can truly commit murder, or if the onus should be on the person giving them the orders, woven in with the ethics of a refugee situation. I did find, in places, that the amount of internal and external debate on these topics impacted the pacing of the read, as well as the fact that there are few areas where it’s easy to lose track of whose viewpoint the story is being told from: an icon is thought of as an ‘it’, and considers itself to be an ‘it’, so I occasionally found myself backtracking to figure out exactly who I was hearing from. Aside from that, though, this book is emphatically worth the read. The world-building is rock-solid, the characters are well-developed, and the story has a number of relatable elements.
Reviewed for By Rite of Word.
The premise of Icon Violet offers a lot of interesting concepts to consider along with the story; with the question of AI and self-determinism, author Simon Fay brings up whether or not an AI can truly commit murder, or if the onus should be on the person giving them the orders, woven in with the ethics of a refugee situation. I did find, in places, that the amount of internal and external debate on these topics impacted the pacing of the read, as well as the fact that there are few areas where it’s easy to lose track of whose viewpoint the story is being told from: an icon is thought of as an ‘it’, and considers itself to be an ‘it’, so I occasionally found myself backtracking to figure out exactly who I was hearing from. Aside from that, though, this book is emphatically worth the read. The world-building is rock-solid, the characters are well-developed, and the story has a number of relatable elements.
Reviewed for By Rite of Word.
September 22, 2023
Here is my second SPSFC3 Space Girls review!
Status in the contest: Pending
Read: 100%
When I read books, I usually skip the blurb. Sometimes I only have a brief glance at the cover and fret over the title and number of pages. Other than that, I tend to enter books without knowing anything about them. Another thing I have noticed over the years is I tend to know which book will end up as a 5 star read within the first 5% of the book. Doesn't work everytime, but usually you notice there is something about a book when you start that it will trump most other reads.
For a while, this book was heading straight for a 5 star read. This author has certainly found their unique writing voice and can make the reader connect to characters, even ones that only appear for half a page. In every sense of the word, this book is really, really good. It has nailed the magic formula to make a compelling read. June and Violet are fabulous characters.
The worldbuilding gives me huge vibes from the Vandread anime and the Will Smith film I, Robot. I know that movie was panned in the cinema at the time for just being a 2 hour commercial ad with lots of special effects. I think I am one of the few people that saw it in cinemas and liked it. Sonny reminds me a lot of Violet. Both are standard issue humanoid robots that are supposed to look like everyone else that begin to question who they are and their purpose. Sonny was programmed from the start to have a unique personality so that it could help their scientist owner to commit suicide, whereas Violet does this organically over the centuries after a series of life experiences that stay embedded into their memory.
This book is kind of like a bizarro Vandread. While humanity flees a polluted and culturally incompatible Earth to colonize new planets in both stories, they differ in huge ways. In Vandread, the first generation of each planet knows they are Earth's slaves and will sacrifice their people (some planetary systems do rebel though). Each planet has cultural and other factors that make different organ systems more valuable for "the harvest". The protagonists in Vandread are men and women from two rival planets where everyone is the same gender (and thus heterosexuality is taboo) and end up trapped in an unstable colonizer ship when a band of pirates from the female planet attack a male military fleet. The series focuses on how men and women learn to trust eachother and join forces against the Earthlings that want to kill them.
Icon-Violet veers away from Vandread in several key factors. One, while Earthlings have become abominable monstruosities with altered bodies, in this book they live normal lifespans and are technologically behind the conquerors. Both stories do mention the atmosphere spews acid rain and it is becoming incompatible with life, so it does remind me of how Earth started to become the enemy civilization in Vandread. Whereas in Vandread the Earthlings create floating sky cities and turn to harvesting organs because they have become infertile, the humans in Icon-Violet are still fertile and live on the surface. Will they end up in a similar situation to the Vandread Earthlings in a few centuries? Maybe!
The colonizer society is quite the opposite of Vandread. They strive for everyone to be the exact same way. It is like some kind of weird Stepford Wives story where they take the annoyance to travel 100 years somewhere and build a space station with identical looking strip malls and mass produced suburbia houses. I swear I was getting Fight Club monologue vibes here. I never quite understood why they would create human inhabitation with such huge space differences when the story gives zero hints anyone even lives on a planet. Seems like everyone lives in different huge space stations. Benedict is very similar to planet Mejere, which is the female birth planet in Vandread. A series of hermetically sealed space pod cities that float on the planet's clouds. The station where Violet has lived most of their existence is called Provinence, which is supposed to be located in the Solar System, just a few months away from Earth. Their close proximity to Earth means they are constantly thwarting illegal immigrants and some key staff live in Earth for brief diplomatic assignments.
I continue to feel confused about Icons. They function in a similar way to the I, Robot ones, but they are semi biological with auto repair nanomachines (they are insanely hard to kill) and don't have the Asimov three laws. Icons have stomachs (I guess they use the bathroom too?), but are capable of surviving in space for 1 year. If a higher ranked space station official tells Icons to murder someone, they are supposed to follow suit. It's quite surprising this suburbia space utopia hasn't fallen into disorder given the fact it is possible to hack into Icons and turn them into killing machines. Whether either this or Earthlings someday develop technology that surpasses the colonies will cause an impact in the future, both seem like equal possibilities. Maybe even Icons gain sentinence and start disobeying their human overlords.
I would not like to spoil the plot of this book, but it continues giving me vibes from I, Robot and Vandread throughout the whole story. The ruler of Benedict reminds me of the old lady that commands the rebel island city in the Fafner anime (looks can deceive you). I really enjoyed the cat and mouse tension as Violet and June want to rip each other's throats half of the book while at the same time learning to respect each other. I don't wish to spoil anything else. Let the reader see the story for itself. I do however hate the eugenics of colony society. They purposely don't want children with inheritable genetic defects (yet plenty of them are de novo mutations). They seem a very ableist society to me.
Now, for everything great about this book (the truly imaginative worldbuilding, the fabulous characters with believable motives and tension filled story), I could not give it 5 stars. I wanted to, though! Every writer has tics and I feel this author loves writing the word "it" in variable iterations way too much. It this, its that... I could spot over 30 it, its, & it's in one page. Obviously, this pronoun is needed in the POV chapters focusing on Icons like Violet and its sibling Yellow. But most of the its in the book could be replaced with other words like their or theirs. Maybe even completely reworded sentences here and there can tone down the ititis. I also noticed a heavy-handed aversion to the words "it has". I am unsure if certain British English variants have vastly different grammar rules where the word "has" can be replaced by an "it's" (as in: it's a good chance to win this battle against the robot). To me, they sounded like incorrect grammar usage and I spotted it over 20 times in the book. Plenty of instances where apostrophes were also incorrectly used. I am not referring to Icon POV chapters where they refer to themselves with it pronouns or it is a case of establishing ownership of objects with names with an S at the end like James (James's book, for example). I noticed far too many instances where sentences were incomplete. I understood the meaning, but you know the sentence is missing prepositions such as "to" or "in". The missing words are not even idioms, but rather common use sentences describing an action. I also spotted one or two instances where their and there are mixed up.
In a nutshell, this book has what it takes to become a fabulous read. The author mastered the hard part, so the word usage quip is fortunately something that can be easily fixed in a future edition. I would not know if proofreader editors focus on these issues or line edit ones. These problems seem like a simple fix and would be a worthwhile investment. This story could be a great standalone, or the start of a new series with plenty of different ways for the story to go.
Status in the contest: Pending
Read: 100%
When I read books, I usually skip the blurb. Sometimes I only have a brief glance at the cover and fret over the title and number of pages. Other than that, I tend to enter books without knowing anything about them. Another thing I have noticed over the years is I tend to know which book will end up as a 5 star read within the first 5% of the book. Doesn't work everytime, but usually you notice there is something about a book when you start that it will trump most other reads.
For a while, this book was heading straight for a 5 star read. This author has certainly found their unique writing voice and can make the reader connect to characters, even ones that only appear for half a page. In every sense of the word, this book is really, really good. It has nailed the magic formula to make a compelling read. June and Violet are fabulous characters.
The worldbuilding gives me huge vibes from the Vandread anime and the Will Smith film I, Robot. I know that movie was panned in the cinema at the time for just being a 2 hour commercial ad with lots of special effects. I think I am one of the few people that saw it in cinemas and liked it. Sonny reminds me a lot of Violet. Both are standard issue humanoid robots that are supposed to look like everyone else that begin to question who they are and their purpose. Sonny was programmed from the start to have a unique personality so that it could help their scientist owner to commit suicide, whereas Violet does this organically over the centuries after a series of life experiences that stay embedded into their memory.
This book is kind of like a bizarro Vandread. While humanity flees a polluted and culturally incompatible Earth to colonize new planets in both stories, they differ in huge ways. In Vandread, the first generation of each planet knows they are Earth's slaves and will sacrifice their people (some planetary systems do rebel though). Each planet has cultural and other factors that make different organ systems more valuable for "the harvest". The protagonists in Vandread are men and women from two rival planets where everyone is the same gender (and thus heterosexuality is taboo) and end up trapped in an unstable colonizer ship when a band of pirates from the female planet attack a male military fleet. The series focuses on how men and women learn to trust eachother and join forces against the Earthlings that want to kill them.
Icon-Violet veers away from Vandread in several key factors. One, while Earthlings have become abominable monstruosities with altered bodies, in this book they live normal lifespans and are technologically behind the conquerors. Both stories do mention the atmosphere spews acid rain and it is becoming incompatible with life, so it does remind me of how Earth started to become the enemy civilization in Vandread. Whereas in Vandread the Earthlings create floating sky cities and turn to harvesting organs because they have become infertile, the humans in Icon-Violet are still fertile and live on the surface. Will they end up in a similar situation to the Vandread Earthlings in a few centuries? Maybe!
The colonizer society is quite the opposite of Vandread. They strive for everyone to be the exact same way. It is like some kind of weird Stepford Wives story where they take the annoyance to travel 100 years somewhere and build a space station with identical looking strip malls and mass produced suburbia houses. I swear I was getting Fight Club monologue vibes here. I never quite understood why they would create human inhabitation with such huge space differences when the story gives zero hints anyone even lives on a planet. Seems like everyone lives in different huge space stations. Benedict is very similar to planet Mejere, which is the female birth planet in Vandread. A series of hermetically sealed space pod cities that float on the planet's clouds. The station where Violet has lived most of their existence is called Provinence, which is supposed to be located in the Solar System, just a few months away from Earth. Their close proximity to Earth means they are constantly thwarting illegal immigrants and some key staff live in Earth for brief diplomatic assignments.
I continue to feel confused about Icons. They function in a similar way to the I, Robot ones, but they are semi biological with auto repair nanomachines (they are insanely hard to kill) and don't have the Asimov three laws. Icons have stomachs (I guess they use the bathroom too?), but are capable of surviving in space for 1 year. If a higher ranked space station official tells Icons to murder someone, they are supposed to follow suit. It's quite surprising this suburbia space utopia hasn't fallen into disorder given the fact it is possible to hack into Icons and turn them into killing machines. Whether either this or Earthlings someday develop technology that surpasses the colonies will cause an impact in the future, both seem like equal possibilities. Maybe even Icons gain sentinence and start disobeying their human overlords.
I would not like to spoil the plot of this book, but it continues giving me vibes from I, Robot and Vandread throughout the whole story. The ruler of Benedict reminds me of the old lady that commands the rebel island city in the Fafner anime (looks can deceive you). I really enjoyed the cat and mouse tension as Violet and June want to rip each other's throats half of the book while at the same time learning to respect each other. I don't wish to spoil anything else. Let the reader see the story for itself. I do however hate the eugenics of colony society. They purposely don't want children with inheritable genetic defects (yet plenty of them are de novo mutations). They seem a very ableist society to me.
Now, for everything great about this book (the truly imaginative worldbuilding, the fabulous characters with believable motives and tension filled story), I could not give it 5 stars. I wanted to, though! Every writer has tics and I feel this author loves writing the word "it" in variable iterations way too much. It this, its that... I could spot over 30 it, its, & it's in one page. Obviously, this pronoun is needed in the POV chapters focusing on Icons like Violet and its sibling Yellow. But most of the its in the book could be replaced with other words like their or theirs. Maybe even completely reworded sentences here and there can tone down the ititis. I also noticed a heavy-handed aversion to the words "it has". I am unsure if certain British English variants have vastly different grammar rules where the word "has" can be replaced by an "it's" (as in: it's a good chance to win this battle against the robot). To me, they sounded like incorrect grammar usage and I spotted it over 20 times in the book. Plenty of instances where apostrophes were also incorrectly used. I am not referring to Icon POV chapters where they refer to themselves with it pronouns or it is a case of establishing ownership of objects with names with an S at the end like James (James's book, for example). I noticed far too many instances where sentences were incomplete. I understood the meaning, but you know the sentence is missing prepositions such as "to" or "in". The missing words are not even idioms, but rather common use sentences describing an action. I also spotted one or two instances where their and there are mixed up.
In a nutshell, this book has what it takes to become a fabulous read. The author mastered the hard part, so the word usage quip is fortunately something that can be easily fixed in a future edition. I would not know if proofreader editors focus on these issues or line edit ones. These problems seem like a simple fix and would be a worthwhile investment. This story could be a great standalone, or the start of a new series with plenty of different ways for the story to go.
spsfc3-4-5
September 15, 2023Disclaimer: Reading as a judge for SPSFC3
All reviews/ratings are my own personal opinions.
I actually read to approx 50% — i don't read blurbs or reviews before I start these books so at the onset the plot seemed defined and reasonably clear; 2 icons (robots) synced together (usually as a group of 6) with no definitive individuality they seem to have some thoughts of their own (our POV is Violet) but nothing that marks them as truly independent. However this changes when Violet and Yellow get sent to a mission to a non responsive ship. Communication is the key for icons and this mission is poorly worded. Suddenly years of synchronicity is gone when Yellow breaks away and acts and behaves as an individual. Whilst some people are happy to see Yellow terminated (she is of course only an AI), Violet wants to find her fellow icon and find out why the betrayal and what in her commands made her behave this way.
Up to a certain point I was semi enjoying this but there were a few small info dumps here and there which affected the pacing. Around the 35/40% mark when Violet and a human called June start wandering the ship my mind started to wander as well. Though June's life as an Earther may become important later but it was a massive info dump in the wrong place and pulled me right out of the story. It also felt rather unbelievable that the Executive put Violet and June together considering June's earlier behaviour. DNF
All reviews/ratings are my own personal opinions.
I actually read to approx 50% — i don't read blurbs or reviews before I start these books so at the onset the plot seemed defined and reasonably clear; 2 icons (robots) synced together (usually as a group of 6) with no definitive individuality they seem to have some thoughts of their own (our POV is Violet) but nothing that marks them as truly independent. However this changes when Violet and Yellow get sent to a mission to a non responsive ship. Communication is the key for icons and this mission is poorly worded. Suddenly years of synchronicity is gone when Yellow breaks away and acts and behaves as an individual. Whilst some people are happy to see Yellow terminated (she is of course only an AI), Violet wants to find her fellow icon and find out why the betrayal and what in her commands made her behave this way.
Up to a certain point I was semi enjoying this but there were a few small info dumps here and there which affected the pacing. Around the 35/40% mark when Violet and a human called June start wandering the ship my mind started to wander as well. Though June's life as an Earther may become important later but it was a massive info dump in the wrong place and pulled me right out of the story. It also felt rather unbelievable that the Executive put Violet and June together considering June's earlier behaviour. DNF
December 9, 2016
Mind-stretching science fiction set in a far-future space-going human civilisation.
This is the kind of science fiction that throws the reader in the deep end. If you enjoy grappling with new ideas, there’s plenty to get to grips with here. The ‘icons’ of the title, for example, are actually artificially grown humanoid slaves (i think) who for some reason come in sets of seven, each individual identified with a colour. And the whole set have the same memories, hence are usually interchangeable.
The setting is the far future. An epic scale human civilisation spreads across many star systems, while an overcrowded Earth is quarantined (we don’t want any of them filthy Earthers round here).
The basic story is of a single icon (Violet) pursuing its rogue sibling (Yellow), with the reluctant help of an unfriendly human policewoman.
At times the narrative can get rather dense and wordy, but the writing is generally good with few editing errors.
This is the kind of science fiction that throws the reader in the deep end. If you enjoy grappling with new ideas, there’s plenty to get to grips with here. The ‘icons’ of the title, for example, are actually artificially grown humanoid slaves (i think) who for some reason come in sets of seven, each individual identified with a colour. And the whole set have the same memories, hence are usually interchangeable.
The setting is the far future. An epic scale human civilisation spreads across many star systems, while an overcrowded Earth is quarantined (we don’t want any of them filthy Earthers round here).
The basic story is of a single icon (Violet) pursuing its rogue sibling (Yellow), with the reluctant help of an unfriendly human policewoman.
At times the narrative can get rather dense and wordy, but the writing is generally good with few editing errors.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews