Operation Sting (SWARM) by Simon Cheshire

Operation Sting (SWARM) by Simon Cheshire
Buy Operation Sting (SWARM) by Simon Cheshire at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: Confident Readers
Reviewer: John Lloyd
Summary: A series opener that intends to introduce seven robotic creepy-crawlies on the side of good, but the whole approach and idea suffers in conception and delivery.
Buy? Maybe	Borrow? Maybe
Pages: 160	Date: May 2014
Publisher: Stripes Publishing
ISBN: 9781847154378
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There are bugs and there are bugs. The latest ultra-secret British security body, SWARM, uses both at the same time – micro-robots based around the forms of a mosquito, scorpion, spider, butterfly, stag beetle, dragonfly and centipede. They're only supposed to be showing themselves off as surveillance operatives while a high-tech weapon device is transported by a sole human agent across London, when it's stolen. The dangers of it being in the wrong hands, the very fact that the demonstration failed, and the disapproval of the Home Secretary at not knowing SWARM ever was on the cards in the first place, all pile the pressure onto the tiny robots' shoulders…

And there is pressure on the author too, as he starts a lengthy series with this inaugural episode. Pressure he fails to live under. You make them sound like humans, a human observer says of the bugs when told of their individual aspects. The problem is that Cheshire does not – and probably could not – do the same. I'll try and ignore the fact that they're routinely called insects, when the last I looked spiders and scorpions aren't insects. However much he has sat down and thought through different attributes and operational skills for them all, they just don't work on the page as heroes.

With an annoying catchphrase – I'm live – they beetle about the drama doing what they have to do, which involves talking to each other in most human terms, despite the ridiculousness of high-tech needing to parse in English and not, er, signal. At this early stage they don't form strong enough characters for us to be interested enough in, and as a result the most sympathy we have throughout the entire book is that of the code-breaker for the baddies.

These are baddies whose world map of attack is supposed to show every major city on earth – so that's apparently Oslo, then, and nothing at all on the US's east coast. It's interesting enough to rattle through the quick drama as a mystery adventure, despite the awkwardness of the protagonists we're supposed to support, and the techno-babble of the exposition could be appealing to the young lad interested in such things. (You can tell the good humans, as they've all had their names cribbed from computing and Internet history, which shows some small thought has been expended.) But with the cold animate robots of SWARM, however much they chatter humanly to each other, I really don't think there is enough appeal to make this a series worth further investigation.

I must thank the publishers for my review copy.

Much more successful was the same author, several years ago, in Colfer-ish teen detective mode. S.W.I.T.C.H: Spider Stampede by Ali Sparkes and Ross Collins is the beginning of a series with a similar thriller drama and small scale, where the bugs are entirely organic.

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