Vault’s Promise, a review by Joanna

More than a decade has passed since brave CleanerBot Block led his motley crew of robots and their human friends and rescued children to the haven of Deer Valley in Minnesota, and they now live in peaceful coexistence. The AI uprising that destroyed the modern world is over, but the world has not recovered, and now the children start getting sick from an illness that was previously rare thanks to routine immunisation. Wally is ostracised by other kids because her adopted father Block  is not human, and resents being treated like a child. To prove herself, she runs away, on a quest to find a hidden cache of lifesaving medicines from an underground bunker, but the world outside is not as safe as she believed and to make it, she is going to need help from some unlikely allies…

These fun sci-fi adventure stories explore what it means to be human and have minor characters from the previous books like VacuuBot and Shadow taking centre stage. Block does feature, but only in a minor way. I found Wally’s petulance and recklessness a bit annoying – teenagers, ugh – and didn’t much like cowardly Sarah either, but I loved all the robot characters and look forward to more of their adventures.
Thanks to Cameron for the advance review copy – I beta read it by private arrangement and was thrilled to see my name in the credits of the final version. Vault’s Promise is available now.