A review by lassarina
The A.I. Who Loved Me by Alyssa Cole
4.0
Oh, this was so charming, with a lot of horrifying dystopia lurking under the edges of the world; it's a relatively near-future setting--far enough that real AI is a thing, certain synthetic foods are incredibly widespread, climate change has definitively taken effect, and the merger of corporatocracy and government is complete, but close enough that it hasn't gone into the deep SF feel of "so little of this lifestyle is recognizable as human-driven."
Trinity and Li Wei are both damaged and recovering from not-very-specified injuries; she's basically on disability light work away from her analyst job in which an accident injured her knee, and Li Wei is learning how to be human since he's actually an AI. The two of them have some absolutely hilarious interactions because of Li Wei being really bad at the whole human-interaction thing, and there are a lot of great asides with various constructs, like the smart-house intelligence, Penny, who is amazing. There's also a bit of a mystery going on, and the pieces of it are revealed slowly and carefully, so that the reader hits the conclusions right before the characters do, which is very effective.
There are definitely parts of this book that are upsetting enough to take it out of the pure-fluff category; the society presented is extremely plausible given our current trajectory, and sometimes that's a little too much for me. I had to stop reading a couple of times because it was in fact too much for me. The intrusion of a smart mirror that detects vital signs and nags Trinity to schedule a medical checkup; the persistent presence and data gathering done by Penny; the fact that the Hive is technically not a government but is so embedded in every aspect of society that it is illegal, literally illegal, to modify their tech. Incredibly sobering.
That said, it's also incredibly hot, and the romance is incredibly funny and charming, and Trinity's friends Rutina and Yana are AMAZING, and I loved the book voerall.
Trinity and Li Wei are both damaged and recovering from not-very-specified injuries; she's basically on disability light work away from her analyst job in which an accident injured her knee, and Li Wei is learning how to be human since he's actually an AI. The two of them have some absolutely hilarious interactions because of Li Wei being really bad at the whole human-interaction thing, and there are a lot of great asides with various constructs, like the smart-house intelligence, Penny, who is amazing. There's also a bit of a mystery going on, and the pieces of it are revealed slowly and carefully, so that the reader hits the conclusions right before the characters do, which is very effective.
There are definitely parts of this book that are upsetting enough to take it out of the pure-fluff category; the society presented is extremely plausible given our current trajectory, and sometimes that's a little too much for me. I had to stop reading a couple of times because it was in fact too much for me. The intrusion of a smart mirror that detects vital signs and nags Trinity to schedule a medical checkup; the persistent presence and data gathering done by Penny; the fact that the Hive is technically not a government but is so embedded in every aspect of society that it is illegal, literally illegal, to modify their tech. Incredibly sobering.
That said, it's also incredibly hot, and the romance is incredibly funny and charming, and Trinity's friends Rutina and Yana are AMAZING, and I loved the book voerall.