Genre: YA Dystopian
Published: February 23, 2004
Pages: 308
Synopsis
Identity crises, consumerism, and star-crossed teenage love in a futuristic society where people connect to the Internet via feeds implanted in their brains.
For Titus and his friends, it started out like any ordinary trip to the moon - a chance to party during spring break and play with some stupid low-grav at the Ricochet Lounge. But that was before the crazy hacker caused all their feeds to malfunction, sending them to the hospital to lie around with nothing inside their heads for days. And it was before Titus met Violet, a beautiful, brainy teenage girl who has decided to fight the feed and its omnipresent ability to categorize human thoughts and desires. Following in the footsteps of George Orwell, Anthony Burgess, and Kurt Vonnegut Jr., M. T. Anderson has created a not-so-brave new world — and a smart, savage satire that has captivated readers with its view of an imagined future that veers unnervingly close to the here and now.
For Titus and his friends, it started out like any ordinary trip to the moon - a chance to party during spring break and play with some stupid low-grav at the Ricochet Lounge. But that was before the crazy hacker caused all their feeds to malfunction, sending them to the hospital to lie around with nothing inside their heads for days. And it was before Titus met Violet, a beautiful, brainy teenage girl who has decided to fight the feed and its omnipresent ability to categorize human thoughts and desires. Following in the footsteps of George Orwell, Anthony Burgess, and Kurt Vonnegut Jr., M. T. Anderson has created a not-so-brave new world — and a smart, savage satire that has captivated readers with its view of an imagined future that veers unnervingly close to the here and now.
Review
I got this free from Audiobook Sync, it was one of the two titles they were offering last week. I probably wouldn’t have any interest in it otherwise, to be honest. I like science fiction and dystopia, but this just looked so overdone. And I was right. The big difference between this and the titles they compare it to (George Orwell, Anthony Burgess, and Kurt Vonnegut Jr., and M. T. Anderson) is it was done so with the most annoying group of teenagers.
One of the only things that kept this book from being marked DNF was that I was listening to the audio version. You get more of an understanding of the feed this way, because they made commercials and news reports and whatnot to make it more immersive. That was pretty cool actually. Although the first time I was confused and didn’t know what was going on.
The thing that keeps this book from being a total dud, excluding the feed bits, is the message that it sends. It’s pretty much a story of a teenage girl, told from the perspective of a guy who is attracted to her, that doesn’t conform to society. And she’s the entire best part of this story. Or the only good part actually.
Maybe my issue with this book is that it’s about the majority of society doing a thing, and I already don’t really conform how I’m expected to. So I already find the basic people to be annoying AF. And I already feel like Violet. Also I was homeschooled by a father who taught me to think for myself. So she’s pretty much me in the future. And that’s really sad, actually.
Anyway, I’m giving this 2.5 Platypires. - Joood - Hooligan
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About the Author
Matthew Tobin Anderson (M. T. Anderson), (1968- ) is an author, primarily of picture books for children and novels for young adults. Anderson lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
His picture books include Handel Who Knew What He Liked; Strange Mr. Satie; The Serpent Came to Gloucester; and Me, All Alone, at the End of the World. He has written such young adult books as Thirsty, Burger Wuss, Feed, The Game of Sunken Places, and Octavian Nothing. For middle grader readers, his novels include Whales on Stilts: M. T. Anderson's Thrilling Tales and its sequel, The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen.
-Wikipedia
His picture books include Handel Who Knew What He Liked; Strange Mr. Satie; The Serpent Came to Gloucester; and Me, All Alone, at the End of the World. He has written such young adult books as Thirsty, Burger Wuss, Feed, The Game of Sunken Places, and Octavian Nothing. For middle grader readers, his novels include Whales on Stilts: M. T. Anderson's Thrilling Tales and its sequel, The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen.
-Wikipedia
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