Altered Carbon  by Richard Morgan

 

On a distant planet, the body of private detective Kovacs had been put into penal storage for some activity.  His mind is brought 180 light years to Earth and is put into a new body so he can investigate a murder.  The victim, Bancroft, is a wealth man whose mind has since been retrieved from a backup copy and placed in a cloned body he had maintained at a special facility.  The police say Bancroft committed suicide.  Bancroft believes he was murdered and wants someone with no links to Earth to find the killer.

 

The story begins at the facility at which Kovacs' mind has been placed in the new body.  In the description of the events at the facility and traveling to the Bancroft estate, we get a lot of background about the world and tech 500 or so years in the future.  It's a future with numerous colony planets.  People who can afford it make backup copies of their minds in case of accidents or violence.  For most people, the backup copy will only be put into another body if an accident or such which is covered by a kind of insurance will pay for it.  Those with more money may be able to afford a new body for their mind when they get elderly - but most can only afford to do this once or twice.  The truly rich can do it indefinitely, causing resentment among those who can't afford it.  There are flying cars (as well as ground cars), blasters as well as projective guns, advertising that controls your brain's sensory processing, AI's (including the one running the hotel Kovacs stays at), and so on.

 

Kovacs was previously part of an elite military group known as the Envoys, who have been trained for special talents that can be carried over from one body to another.  So these skills help Kovacs in his detective work.

 

But it's also the familiar world of crooked cops, prostitutes, thugs in slums, etc.

 

Kovacs finds himself abducted by people who mistake him for the man whose body Kovacs mind has been put in.  TO make him talk, he's tortured at a medical facility that does black market body work.

 

Bancroft's wife seduces Kovacs and promises more sex if he drops the case.

 

Kovacs discovers Bancroft has a history of using prostitutes.  And it turns out that at least one of those prostitutes has a father with a grudge against Bancroft - and a mother in penal storage for computer hacking.

 

The body Kovacs has been put in belongs to a cop who was in penal storage for corruption and abuse.  And the woman cop Kovacs has many dealing with was the lover of the cop in penal storage.

 

Catholics are protesting a proposed law that would allow a dead Catholic's mind to be brought back to life for police investigations. (Catholics believe once the body dies that should be the end of the person.)

 

The book is well written, Morgan has done a good job of world building, the book's pace is good, and the story keeps you guessing.  It should especially appeal to readers who both like SF and mysteries / detective stories.  There was a point later in the book that I had a feeling that rather than wrapping up the story, Morgan was tending to say, "...and here's another section of the book..."  However, I was never bored and the feeling was not of "filler" being added.  Some readers will be disturbed by the violent rampages Kovacs goes into on a few occasions.

 

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