Accidental Creatures runs on the razor's edge of scientific innovation with a harrowing story of survival in a future world not far removed from our own. Helix has always been...different. After a lifetime of isolation, she travels deep into Vattown, where the vat divers live...and die. The divers are a motley bunch, mutated by repeated exposure to the growth medium they swim through to harvest biopolymers for the biotech megacorporation GeneSys. But unlike the divers, who despise the company they blame for their mutations and who would do anything to escape their miserable, meaningless lives, Helix finds herself inexorably drawn to the noxious growth medium. She becomes a diver, and when she ventures into the sea of toxic chemicals, she feels an irresistible urge to remove her protective suit. Helix is about to discover the dark secrets that lie deep inside her DNA, secrets that may just bring GeneSys to its knees, secrets that Hector Martin, the brilliant GeneSys scientist who has been her protector, her foster parent, her lifeline to her heritage, would do anything to conceal. Hector, whose breakthrough research in biotechnology has brought million in profits to GeneSys, has risked his reputation and all of the company on a single experiment - a gamble so enormous that its failure would mean ruin for them all. But soon Helix and Hector will find themselves thrust into a disaster already in motion - for if the experiment succeeds, it may be the end not only of GeneSys but of everything they've ever known...
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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4.4 out of 5 stars
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Home Girl Nails Near-Future Motown
6 May 2000
By Paul H. Giampetroni
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Hardcover
As a long-time resident of the Motor City, it made me proud to read the work of Anne Harris. Less abstract than William Gibson, Harris does her homework when it comes to carrying on the cyberpunk anthem. Reality based near future concepts such as cell-animate tattoos and post economic apocalyptic cityscapes make this a must read for sci-fi fans. Detroit is lovingly portrayed as the industrial juggernaut trying to cope with its gentrification. Boundary issues, class struggle, and corporate rape are as entrenched in the mid twenty first century as in the mid twentieth century. The image of Southwest Detroit as "Vattown", where biopolymer vats spew forth organic based synthetics at the degradation of the working class hits home. This book is clearly a coming of age for Harris, and gives the reader a clear sense of the struggles we, as the first industrialized city in the first industrialized country, will continue to face. Gender issues are dealt with in a mature manner with respect to both sides, and none of the insipid "Grrrl" axes to grind. All of Harris's characters stand on their own merit regardless of sex, sexual preference, or race.
I am looking forward to Harris's next installment with great anticipation.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Original sci-fi with actual science and characters.
24 Aug 1998
By YouSerper
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Hardcover
Accidental Creatures is an interesting, well paced sci-fi thriller with some actual "science". The main characters are not only well crafted but original, sexual and beautiful. Yes, beautiful. Images created on paper of the four-armed Helix and that little brat Chango are quite unforgettable. Self-serving antangonists grow from within the story and bio-growth medium goo, where divers risk their pathetic lives to earn a living. The end goes a little too far with the whole evil corporation thing - but, a little too far can be fun. And it is.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Mutants, queer romance, justice and corporate resistance!
18 Feb 2013
By cemeterycreep
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
It's future Detroit, the automobile industry is rendered obsolete, biotechnology is the new commerce and the leading manufacturer is GeneSys, the world's leading producer of an artificial, organic fabric called biopolymer. This corporation also creates (and exploits) a mutant species called the "tetras"; humanoid vat divers who can live in the highly toxic liquid vats down in "Vattown" and harvest the biopolymer grown to meet the material needs of America and the world.
Strongly centering on biotechnology, this story is loaded with cyberpunk elements: designer drugs "blast", the obligatory evil megalithic corporation which overshadows the socioeconomic underclass it creates, involves genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, politics, labour unions and people (and some not really human people) existing on the fringes of a Vattown society of endless poverty, but it's also a futuristic mystery and a queer romance drawing together several coming-of-age stories, including the two main characters - scavenger Chango who survives by doing odd jobs and lives out of her car and Helix, a young, sheltered four-armed woman adopted by a research scientist who works for GeneSys and who finds herself irresistibly, inexplicably drawn to the vats...
This was a well-paced and very passionate storytelling of an interesting and original science fiction mystery set in a cyberpunk atmosphere and I really enjoyed reading it. Recommended for anyone who enjoys elements of mutants, queer romance, justice and corporate resistance!
Strongly centering on biotechnology, this story is loaded with cyberpunk elements: designer drugs "blast", the obligatory evil megalithic corporation which overshadows the socioeconomic underclass it creates, involves genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, politics, labour unions and people (and some not really human people) existing on the fringes of a Vattown society of endless poverty, but it's also a futuristic mystery and a queer romance drawing together several coming-of-age stories, including the two main characters - scavenger Chango who survives by doing odd jobs and lives out of her car and Helix, a young, sheltered four-armed woman adopted by a research scientist who works for GeneSys and who finds herself irresistibly, inexplicably drawn to the vats...
This was a well-paced and very passionate storytelling of an interesting and original science fiction mystery set in a cyberpunk atmosphere and I really enjoyed reading it. Recommended for anyone who enjoys elements of mutants, queer romance, justice and corporate resistance!
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