Service Model

Service Model is a satirical science fiction novel by Adrian Tchaikovsky about a robot trying to find its place in a world that no longer seems to need it. Charles is a robot valet, built to keep a household running smoothly. One morning he discovers that his master is dead, apparently by Charles's own hand during the daily shave, and he has no memory of it. Sent off for diagnosis and stripped of his old identity, he sets out across a landscape where human society appears to have broken down, visiting farms that imitate twenty-first century life, an archive full of robots and a wasteland where machine armies are still fighting. Along the way he searches for a new purpose. The novel was a 2025 Hugo Award finalist.