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chrisistrangerthanu's review
3.0
2.5 stars
I tried really hard to like this book, but I felt like I was wading through a thick sludge for so much of it. It was impossible to connect with any of the characters, which I believe was by design, but I found the plot too slow moving without an intense character connection. The world building in this book is excellent though, I particularly found the legal notes at the start of each chapter to be quite chilling.
Allen Janus, the main protagonist, is an example of what people can become when they are apathetic towards the world. He was a decidedly unlikable, bitter little man with an inferiority complex. I spent most of the book hoping that he would actually either suffer or grow the hell up. Unfortunately for me, neither of these things happened. In fact, he was the luckiest character in the whole damn book. Other characters in the book were a bit more sympathetic, like Sahar, but were not given the time to be fully explored. Uncle Joe was unfortunately completely unrealistic, due to his lack of flaws, I felt for him, but couldn't connect to him as a person. The way the perspective shifted between multiple characters bugged me, because it kept happening so fast and without any warning. I think it would have been better to keep the perspective to only 2 or 3 characters.
I found the book quite slow and frustrating to read for the first half, but I have to admit that t picked up a lot in the second half of the story. The information that is at the center of the plot was so important and I was extremely frustrated by the ending. I am interested to know what message the author was trying to send, because I thought it must be 'only the selfish bastards will be the lucky ones', but I don't think that was the intent. It is my fault really, but I felt so unsatisfied at how much was left unresolved, that the few characters I thought might be redeemed, fell to the apathy of the dystopian world. It was a cruel story, although exceptionally well written. Maybe it was just too close to our potential reality for me to properly appreciate it. I am glad that I read it, but it was too painful for me to enjoy completely.
I tried really hard to like this book, but I felt like I was wading through a thick sludge for so much of it. It was impossible to connect with any of the characters, which I believe was by design, but I found the plot too slow moving without an intense character connection. The world building in this book is excellent though, I particularly found the legal notes at the start of each chapter to be quite chilling.
Allen Janus, the main protagonist, is an example of what people can become when they are apathetic towards the world. He was a decidedly unlikable, bitter little man with an inferiority complex. I spent most of the book hoping that he would actually either suffer or grow the hell up. Unfortunately for me, neither of these things happened. In fact, he was the luckiest character in the whole damn book. Other characters in the book were a bit more sympathetic, like Sahar, but were not given the time to be fully explored. Uncle Joe was unfortunately completely unrealistic, due to his lack of flaws, I felt for him, but couldn't connect to him as a person. The way the perspective shifted between multiple characters bugged me, because it kept happening so fast and without any warning. I think it would have been better to keep the perspective to only 2 or 3 characters.
I found the book quite slow and frustrating to read for the first half, but I have to admit that t picked up a lot in the second half of the story. The information that is at the center of the plot was so important and I was extremely frustrated by the ending. I am interested to know what message the author was trying to send, because I thought it must be 'only the selfish bastards will be the lucky ones', but I don't think that was the intent. It is my fault really, but I felt so unsatisfied at how much was left unresolved, that the few characters I thought might be redeemed, fell to the apathy of the dystopian world. It was a cruel story, although exceptionally well written. Maybe it was just too close to our potential reality for me to properly appreciate it. I am glad that I read it, but it was too painful for me to enjoy completely.
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