Reviews with content warning for Homophobia - Autonomous

This book brings up some really interesting concepts and worldbuilding, but sadly they are undercooked. The ending also left a bad taste in my mouth and made me second guess everything I thought the author understood.

Like, Eliasz and Paladin are essentially FBI agents for a worse govt carrying out extrajudicial murders for a corporate coverup. Eliasz explicitly notes that he changed from his previous job hunting down child traffickers because he likes how cut and dry the corporate patent laws are re: who's the bad guy and they also will let him do whatever he personally thinks is justified while in the field. They cover up each killing for them. This is all bad! And he grooms Paladin into doing the same thing, because Paladin is enslaved and has been built with programs to make them want to please their owners and even experience love towards them. He even uses Paladin to get off at a point where Paladin has basically no understanding of what's going on or what sex means. It seemed like Paladin was having a moment of questioning what was truly right while in Vancouver with the other autonomous bots, but one call from Eliasz and right back to torture (of an unrelated person no less). This is all concluded with them basically succeeding in their campaign (the company shuts down all negative press and has the reports pulled, and the bot who managed to get video footage of them torturing a scientist never uses it for. some reason. If you build in a police violence cameras allegory, why would you do nothing with it?) and getting away to live together on Mars. It makes me wonder if the author intended all the stuff about human indenture parallels, trafficking, and corporate + pharmaceutical human rights issues to be just a plot vehicle for the two to fall in love, which would be really disappointing.

Also, I don't know that it's right to categorize this as an lgbt-friendly story. The robot Paladin states multiple times that they are genderless and merely allow humans to use male pronouns for them because that's what people assume when looking at them. They decide to allow Eliasz to start misgendering them as a woman instead of as a man because they can tell how much he wants to after finding out their original organ donor was a woman--basically just so he can act on his desire for them without addressing his mindset that men being with men are f*****s (his word) and wrong. And again -- the author's conceptualization of the robot's ability to genuinely consent to anything Eliasz asks is pretty debatable given the programs the robot is forced to run while indentured. And the WLW are all murdered, tortured, or sent into hiding. All in all not exactly the lgbt scifi romance win it has been marketed in some places as.

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bebidocrimes's review against another edition

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mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This opens an interesting discussion into where strict pharmacy patents can lead, and the idea of what is private property and who has the rights to it. It shows many ways a revolution can be conceptualized and enacted, as well as the downfalls and dangers. The indenture culture in this world is fascinating and horrifying, where if AI can be indentured for the cost of their creation, well then people can be too. This makes Threezed and Med an incredible foil to one another. I don't think Paladin has completely thought through her choices in the end, and I believe the loyalty programming did affect her decision making after autonomy. She's being fetishized and she subconsciously recognizes this through Eliasz not understanding or wanting to understand bots outside of anthropomorphizing her.

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imjustadow's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.25

This is such a complicated review to write.

On the one hand, I loved Jack. Bisexual, anti-corporate, emancipator pirate lady? I'm all in, say less. Her life and experiences were very enjoyable to read and I really enjoyed her interactions with the other characters in her insane life.

But GOD, the stuff with Eliasz just kind of ruined everything for me. I don't like the way his "relationship" with Paladin played out starting from THAT chapter (if you've read it, you know which one I'm talking about). The fact that it was never resolved really made having any sympathy at all for Eliasz' quest to stop Jack next to impossible

Eliasz, at the end of the day, is a deeply homophobic cop who has no issue whatsoever with killing people to get what he wants. And more disgusting than that, he feels all of his actions are justified by him "following the law." He mentions that his time hunting down child traffickers was hell and that now that he was in patent law everything was simple and black and white, but that's such a one-dimensional state for a character to begin in, and never grow from as a person.

I loved the worldbuilding, the concept is fascinating, but I really ultimately did not enjoy this book, and I really really wanted to

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meg_thebrave's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

This is a book I’m sitting on and thinking about for a long, long while. As soon as I thought I’d figured out which character to root for, something would shift and I’d question that character’s actions. A sometimes violent, complex, and really well done story.

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julaun's review against another edition

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adventurous dark hopeful tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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amalyndb's review against another edition

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4.5

I want to reread this one

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