"Kouri no Kuni no Amaririsu" (Amaryllis in the Ice Country) by Matsuyama Takeshi. A story about robots trying their best to find ways where both robots and humans can survive the harsh ice age. It can be read as a parable about sharing, where the only win-win strategy is to divide resources among everyone. Even then, sometimes sacrifices must be made so that anyone can survive at all.
While the greater theme may be about sharing in times of energy crisis, the highlights of this book are the individual characters. All of them are portrayed as very loyal to humans, and at the same time unselfish toward their own robot community. Despite the ice age backdrop, you would get a warm and fuzzy feeling while following these characters. Coincidentally, most of them are named after some summer flower.
This book feels like a sequel to the author's previous book about robots, mostly because the characters here are equally energy conscious, and are liable to being killed many times over (that's what you get for being robots). Those similarities aside, the characters in this book are more human and more balanced, and this is a better story overall. Definitely worth reading, especially for those who want more out of the previous book.
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