Reviews - Xerox | The StoryGraph

309 reviews for:

Xerox

Fien Veldman

3.4 AVERAGE

itsjustkiwi's review against another edition

2.5

adventurous dark funny medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

uruseibaka's review against another edition

3.0

funny reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

chanelchapters's review against another edition

4.0

3.5

Odd office worker bonds with her printer. Thinks about life whilst working her 9-5.
This was definitely misrepresented. It’s not a printer-human romance. It’s a stream of consciousness about human life and the world we live in. With one small chapter in the printers POV (imma name him Perry). There were some funny sarcastic comments about being a cog in the corporate machine and lots of other little beautiful jewels about life sprinkled throughout.
It’s slow paced but I was in the mood for a book that’s a combination of Ripe, The New Me, Winter in Sokcho & The Convenient Store Woman.

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oywiththepoodles's review against another edition

4.75

funny reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

pranreadsalot's review against another edition

5.0

This is clearly aiming for the Convenience Store Woman demographic, but I also see so much of Emi Yagi's Diary of a Void DNA here.

Obviously, the plot, at least at the beginning, is absurd. Woman lives an extremely monotonous corporate life, struggles separating herself for her work, starts talking to her printer which, according to her, responds through beeps and other sounds a printer usually makes. It's funny and depressing in this extremely charming way, laughing away at the often disturbing subject matter of the narrator struggling with her identity so much outside work, that she doesn't even care to name her colleagues: to her, the guy who does marketing is named Marketing, the one managing partnerships is Partnerships, and so on.

The book is mis-marketed. Yes, this is about the printer-woman relationship, but that's around 30% of the plot. Instead, the conversations the woman has with the printer forms a frame narrative through which we learn dark and disturbing secrets of her troubled childhood, as well as funny and insightful observations about the monotony of life in general. It's this perfect balancing act of using a neutral, uncaring, slightly unhinged voice for both of these disparate aspects that makes this such a fun read. Apart from that, there's the present day narrative of her doing her very menial, boring tasks: answering emails, collecting packages, taking care of her printer, etc. During these sections, she seems to drift often and starts monologuing about anything from the meaning of life to the best ways to put paper in the printer, leading to either absolute comic gold or surprisingly insightful commentary about the pathetic state of our world.

So combine the unhingedness of Convenience Store Woman with the absurdity and corporate vibes of Diary of a Void, and you get Hard Copy: whimsical, funny, depressing and deeply relatable.