Without a Thought (Berserker Wars)

[RooksBailey]

(A cool French cover)

As I wrote in a different post, the reason why I have fallen head over heels for AI War is how evocative it is of one of my favorite sci-fi series of all time, Fred Saberhagen's Berserker Wars.  If you like AI War, you should really give the series a try.     Anyway, I found a treat for those of you not familiar with these stories.  The very first Berserker short story, Without a Thought, is available online!  It's a great story as it not only establishes the Berserker mythos, but it also involves the art of game design (which should prove popular around these parts ).   Check it out here (it starts on page 40, in case the link is broken):

http://books.google.com/books?id=3PSTqQrrzjEC&pg=PA40&lpg=PA40&dq=Without+a+Thought+Saberhagen&source=bl&ots=46OO3gTxi7&sig=bo7fzeLZWSkDbMOxDDoU4ldTUHk&hl=en&ei=YTONTLnuKIO88ga55cnYCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBYQ6AEwADgK#v=onepage&q=Without%20a%20Thought%20Saberhagen&f=false

[LintMan]

I read all the Berserker books in a flurry back in the early-mid-90's, through what I thought was the conclusion.  I really loved them all, but IIRC that last one was really confusing at the end.

I was surprised to discover only recently that he wrote several more books in the series after that.  Clearly, it wasn't as much a conclusion as I thought...   

[RooksBailey]

Saberhagan was prolific.  Unfortunately, I think sometimes it worked against him as his novels could be very hit or miss.  It is sad that we may never have another Berserker story now that he has passed on.  I hope David Weber picks up the banner.  He would be a natural for a Berserker story as he did a really good job taking over for Keith Laumer on the Bolo series.

[Peeka]

This may be too late for this forum... but I'm looking for a Berserker story that was about a old ancient derelict that was found by the crew of a space ship being pursued by a Berserker.  The derelict was different than other Berserker machines ... and one of the crew decided to reactivate it even though the other crew members nervous.  Well, the derelict turned out to be a defensive mechanism built by the alien race that were the opponents of the aliens that built the Berserkers.   The story ends with the reactivated mechanism easily destroying the persuing  Berserker and then leaving to look for other Berserker machines. 
The plot may not be as I stated .... but the part of the story that I liked was that the ancient mechanism was designed to destroy Berserker machines ... and did so with ease.