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A review by ablotial
A Calculated Life by Anne Charnock
5.0
This is probably 4.5 stars rather than 5. It wasn't *perfect*. But it was damn good. But I liked it a lot so I'll round up.
Jayna is a data scientist -- a "mathematical modeler" according to the blurb -- who thinks logically and excels over he coworkers but doesn't always succeed at acting "normal". Then she uses data to try to become more normal. The idea of this fascinated me. It turns out there are reasons why she is so different (and yet, not) that weren't mentioned in the blurb. I won't discuss them here, but ... for me it made the book a lot better in some ways, but slightly worse in that it made it less relatable to my own life. But I won't lie -- even after I knew the spoiler I still found myself relating to Jayna quite a bit. I even commented to a friend on mine about it. But I think that was the point. They're not so different after all.
Anyway. I loved watching Jayna grow as a person, and her relationships with Dave and Benjamin and then the others at her Rest Station. I loved trying to imagine how the world would be different if I had no childhood memories to fall back on. Better? But also worse. I was really rooting for her.
The ending... both satisfying and not. There seems to be a lot of that in this book. I recommend it -- especially if you are an analytical type.
Maybe this is our future (but I don't think so).
Jayna is a data scientist -- a "mathematical modeler" according to the blurb -- who thinks logically and excels over he coworkers but doesn't always succeed at acting "normal". Then she uses data to try to become more normal. The idea of this fascinated me. It turns out there are reasons why she is so different (and yet, not) that weren't mentioned in the blurb. I won't discuss them here, but ... for me it made the book a lot better in some ways, but slightly worse in that it made it less relatable to my own life. But I won't lie -- even after I knew the spoiler I still found myself relating to Jayna quite a bit. I even commented to a friend on mine about it. But I think that was the point. They're not so different after all.
Anyway. I loved watching Jayna grow as a person, and her relationships with Dave and Benjamin and then the others at her Rest Station. I loved trying to imagine how the world would be different if I had no childhood memories to fall back on. Better? But also worse. I was really rooting for her.
The ending... both satisfying and not. There seems to be a lot of that in this book. I recommend it -- especially if you are an analytical type.
Maybe this is our future (but I don't think so).