leok's review against another edition
3.0
I’m not entirely sure what to think of this book. On one hand I had difficulty getting over a couple concepts and characters introduced in the book, yet despite these issues, I still rather enjoyed the book. Let me see if I can formulate my thought into a halfway decent review.
Who I like: Mortimer, Victor, Danny, and eventually Owen. Not a complete list, but these were the main characters that stood out the most for me. They were also some of the most flushed out characters in the book, with personalities and traits that were believable and consistent throughout the book. That’s not to say that there wasn’t other character in the book that didn’t share these qualities, only that they didn’t stand out to me as much as these did.
That said, there were a few characters that was given equal amount of backstory and development, but I honestly couldn’t care less about them. Characters like, Samsung, Richard, Owen’s wife (whatever her name was, goes to show how little she meant that I forgot her name 1 day after finishing the book), and many more. This book had several secondary characters that were there just to move the story along or give the protagonist a person to argue with, and there was a lot of that between characters in place of action/plot development. Arguments, debates, verbal obstacles that were only there for the sake of being there.
Then there was the AI’s. The book promised a battle between the AI’s and humanity, but that too also ended up being a discussion between key characters. Fair enough, as it was mentioned in the book, AI’s run on logic and not emotions, but in an `epic battle` between great forces, it ended up being nothing more than some balloon popping.
What I liked: I liked the concepts of AI as it was described in the book. Level 1-3 are different levels of service AI’s, think Alexa of simpler programs for running basic functions, like phones, household functions, etc. Then there was the levels 4-5, which were the AI capable of performing self-driven market analysis, forward thinking, and eventual self-awareness. Then there was the nanotechnology, something currently being researched, but obviously far more advanced in the book. Nanotechnology capable to taking apart and putting back together an object at a molecular level, and create any item from stored files; think Star Trek’s replicators.
What I found difficult to believe was the anti-gravity bubbles/pods/taxis. The story takes place far enough into the further that one can believe that these technological advancements took are achievable, but not so long that 9/11 was that far in the past. Key characters in the book were alive during this event, and were old enough to remember it. So I’m left to believe that in the short amount of time (20-30 years), technology progressed to the point in which scientist created a device with the ability to generate an anti-gravity field around a vessel powered by a nuclear battery. The physics alone to make this possible is mind boggling, but this was simply excused away with some hand-waving science.
Fair enough, a sci-fiction author has the right to do this, but then why is everyone else riding around in cars, buses, air planes, and even helium blimps? Why is there even a need for human taxi drivers when AI’s have shown to be more than capable to pilot mini-nuclear bombs to and from cities and eventual space orbiting platforms? The introduction of these bubbles, which happens within the first couple pages in the book, makes the presence of other technologies in the book seem completely superfluous. I think the author came up with these bubbles as a cool concept, and thought they would be neat to include with in this story, but didn’t think too much about the ramification that would have been caused by the existence of the science to make these devices work.
I was looking for a short book to fill sometime while I was traveling and this did just that. It’s wasn’t by fait the best execution of AI’s and future tech-pocalypse, but I still enjoyed the book. I should not the grievances in the book were only a small portion of the overall book, and could easily be ignored/overlooked by other readers.
Who I like: Mortimer, Victor, Danny, and eventually Owen. Not a complete list, but these were the main characters that stood out the most for me. They were also some of the most flushed out characters in the book, with personalities and traits that were believable and consistent throughout the book. That’s not to say that there wasn’t other character in the book that didn’t share these qualities, only that they didn’t stand out to me as much as these did.
That said, there were a few characters that was given equal amount of backstory and development, but I honestly couldn’t care less about them. Characters like, Samsung, Richard, Owen’s wife (whatever her name was, goes to show how little she meant that I forgot her name 1 day after finishing the book), and many more. This book had several secondary characters that were there just to move the story along or give the protagonist a person to argue with, and there was a lot of that between characters in place of action/plot development. Arguments, debates, verbal obstacles that were only there for the sake of being there.
Then there was the AI’s. The book promised a battle between the AI’s and humanity, but that too also ended up being a discussion between key characters. Fair enough, as it was mentioned in the book, AI’s run on logic and not emotions, but in an `epic battle` between great forces, it ended up being nothing more than some balloon popping.
What I liked: I liked the concepts of AI as it was described in the book. Level 1-3 are different levels of service AI’s, think Alexa of simpler programs for running basic functions, like phones, household functions, etc. Then there was the levels 4-5, which were the AI capable of performing self-driven market analysis, forward thinking, and eventual self-awareness. Then there was the nanotechnology, something currently being researched, but obviously far more advanced in the book. Nanotechnology capable to taking apart and putting back together an object at a molecular level, and create any item from stored files; think Star Trek’s replicators.
What I found difficult to believe was the anti-gravity bubbles/pods/taxis. The story takes place far enough into the further that one can believe that these technological advancements took are achievable, but not so long that 9/11 was that far in the past. Key characters in the book were alive during this event, and were old enough to remember it. So I’m left to believe that in the short amount of time (20-30 years), technology progressed to the point in which scientist created a device with the ability to generate an anti-gravity field around a vessel powered by a nuclear battery. The physics alone to make this possible is mind boggling, but this was simply excused away with some hand-waving science.
Fair enough, a sci-fiction author has the right to do this, but then why is everyone else riding around in cars, buses, air planes, and even helium blimps? Why is there even a need for human taxi drivers when AI’s have shown to be more than capable to pilot mini-nuclear bombs to and from cities and eventual space orbiting platforms? The introduction of these bubbles, which happens within the first couple pages in the book, makes the presence of other technologies in the book seem completely superfluous. I think the author came up with these bubbles as a cool concept, and thought they would be neat to include with in this story, but didn’t think too much about the ramification that would have been caused by the existence of the science to make these devices work.
I was looking for a short book to fill sometime while I was traveling and this did just that. It’s wasn’t by fait the best execution of AI’s and future tech-pocalypse, but I still enjoyed the book. I should not the grievances in the book were only a small portion of the overall book, and could easily be ignored/overlooked by other readers.
reanne's review against another edition
1.0
Well, one star on here means "did not like it" according to the hover-over description, and I'm afraid that accurately describes how I feel about this book. I didn't absolutely hate it, but when all I can think of after finishing the book is all the things I didn't like about it, and when it took me months to listen to because I set it aside for two months and didn't listen to any audiobook at all because I couldn't bring myself to finish this, I can't really give that any more than one star, I'm afraid.
It would take way too long to detail why and it would also be very spoilery, so I'll just say that I found the book very unfocused, spending great deals of time on matters that ended up not being remotely relevant (while spending very little time on important things like the villains), and I also disliked most aspects of the ending.
It would take way too long to detail why and it would also be very spoilery, so I'll just say that I found the book very unfocused, spending great deals of time on matters that ended up not being remotely relevant (while spending very little time on important things like the villains), and I also disliked most aspects of the ending.
everydaymagic's review against another edition
hopeful
mysterious
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
More...