Where does Platform Decay fall in The Murderbot Diaries reading order?

Platform Decay is the eighth entry in Martha Wells's Murderbot Diaries. It follows the events of Network Effect and is set after the climactic events of System Collapse, book seven.

What is Platform Decay about?

Murderbot volunteers to help rescue Dr. Mensah's family, who are being held in indentured servitude on a space station run by the corporation Barish-Estranza. The rescue mission forces Murderbot to spend time with unfamiliar humans, including children, while dealing with the consequences of having freed another SecUnit named Three.

Platform Decay

Science Fiction Space Opera

Pages: 256
Published: 2026
Language: English

Synopsis

Murderbot volunteers for what should be a simple rescue mission — getting Dr. Mensah's family off a space station run by the corporation Barish-Estranza, which has forced them into indentured servitude.

What follows is anything but simple: placating strangers, including human children, coping with the fallout of freeing a fellow SecUnit called Three, and submitting to a new emotional self-diagnostic module Murderbot very much did not ask for.

Set after the events of Network Effect and System Collapse, this eighth entry in the Murderbot Diaries balances Martha Wells's sardonic humor with real emotional stakes.

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