Autonomous by Annalee Newitz
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I first became aware of Annalee Newitz through the science-fiction blog she co-founded, io9.com. I’ve been reading that blog for years and have always held it as my go-to site for all things sci-fi, fantasy, and everything in-between. So when this novel hit my radar I got pretty pumped to finally explore some of her prose.
Autonomous is a really fun ride. Set in the future, this story takes place in a world run in large part by pharmaceutical companies. This has given rise to an underground culture of bio-hackers; pirates who reverse engineer the drug companies’ patents in order to affordably provide them to the masses. The story centers on one such pirate, a woman named Jack, as well as her pursuers, a government agent and his robot partner.
I couldn’t help but imagine this world looking similar to a Neil Blomcamp film: a quasi-futuristic techno-poverty. This is a world, not too dissimilar to our own, in which everyone has access to some sort of technology as its simply a part of life. But, much like our reality, not everyone is treated equally. Robots are a significant presence now, to varying degrees. Most are indentured or employed to preform a specified job. But with time and effort it can be possible to achieve “autonomy”; robotic freedom.
Newitz uses these details as metaphors to explore a variety of sociopolitical issues: big-pharma, piracy, poverty, addiction, sexuality, and identity being the most prominent. The majority of these ideas are explored successfully. The only issue I had was getting my head around the idea of pharmaceutical patents being issued in such a way. But I’d rather have no explanation than a bad one so once I excepted that I probably wasn’t going to get that information it became a non-issue. I found this to be a wise decision, as Newitz is a smart writer. She uses her words in a very accessable, but never dry, way. Her characters are well constructed and engaging. There were even a few moments when a metaphor brought on an actual “ah ha!” moment. And her descriptions of the victims of some of these drugs are downright terrifying. It’s always welcome when an author can provide some new perspective on something in the real world, even if the perspective isn’t aways pleasant.
Autonomous is a fresh, edgy sci-fi novel that’s probably worth your time. Its got a bit of a punk-rock dirty techno vibe. But I like that. I really like that.
View all my reviews
Advertisements Share this:
