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sareidle's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
Graphic: Suicide and Sexual content
Moderate: Car accident, Chronic illness, and Death
Minor: Child death and Kidnapping
eachz's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
I'm pretty sure the author has a humiliation fetish and I say this both because of the EXTREMELY nauseating way every unnecessary sexual encounter was described AND the fact that he put his name on this book.
The whole thing was extremely 12-year-old-who-thinks-hes-deep. Imagine taking a really interesting, nuanced topic like internet privacy and then writing a one-note book with the most BASIC take and no grey area. So much of the time was spent explaining the new tech being developed in this hypothetical era -- which has, by the way, wildly inconsistent levels of ability, which is a pet peeve of mine -- and zero time bringing any dimension or sign of life to the cast of boring, unlikeable, flat characters. No one's motivations remotely make sense, and no one seems to have any thoughts or conversations that aren't a ham-fisted monologue on one end or the other of the ideological spectrum.
For a while I wondered if I was just bothered because it was written 11 years ago and hasn't aged well in terms of the conversation around tech and privacy. But no, I've read plenty of outdated science fiction that was still extremely enjoyable. This was just a terrible book.
Graphic: Violence, Kidnapping, Car accident, Fatphobia, Suicide, and Sexual violence
Moderate: Kidnapping, Body shaming, Panic attacks/disorders, Animal cruelty, Animal death, and Alcohol
Minor: Police brutality, Slavery, Colonisation, and Misogyny
oleducky's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
Graphic: Fatphobia
Minor: Car accident, Body shaming, Child abuse, and Child death
asafekindofhigh's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Graphic: Fatphobia, Toxic relationship, Car accident, Suicide, Body shaming, and Sexual harassment
Moderate: Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Alcohol, Toxic friendship, Gaslighting, Sexual content, Terminal illness, Animal death, and Animal cruelty
cecinamo's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Sometimes it really stressed me out reading about how social interaction and having no privacy were basically mandatory o_o…
The mc is a classical unreliable narrator. It’s maddening how self centered and close minded she is at some points.
The book explores the dangers of a completely digitalized and surveilled world. It’s very interesting and scary.
I think the ending fell a bit short, but overall it was very good! :>
Graphic: Fatphobia, Car accident, Suicide, Alcohol, Animal death, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Gaslighting, Blood, Stalking, Misogyny, Grief, Death, and Mental illness
theloveroflovers's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.25
If you wanr to read the book, listen to the audibook instead.
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Car accident, and Sexual content
Moderate: Child abuse, Body shaming, Bullying, Fatphobia, Kidnapping, Sexual content, Stalking, and Toxic friendship
Minor: Pedophilia, Cancer, Cursing, Kidnapping, Police brutality, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Child abuse, Death, Death of parent, Body shaming, Chronic illness, Classism, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Bullying, Car accident, Child death, Hate crime, Mental illness, and Murder
shortstackmayor's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Graphic: Sexual content, Chronic illness, and Animal death
Moderate: Car accident, Suicide, and Fatphobia
ottercorg's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I love considering at which moment any given reader would finally say The Circle had gone to far. At which new implement does any given reader lose hope?
I read this book thinking about Meta, and now that I've finished I think about it in the context of Ai in this current world.
Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed it. As always, I like books to neatly tie off all plotlines at the end and this one doesn't do that - but apparently this is a series, which means there's still hope...
Moderate: Grief, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic friendship, Kidnapping, Slavery, Death, Medical trauma, Medical content, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexual content, Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Alcohol, Car accident, and Chronic illness
josidosi's review against another edition
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Minor: Car accident
eule's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
- I hate nearly all characters, especially the main character, Mae Holland (arrogant, naïve, selfish, indecisive, biased, disgusting, facile, ignorant, … the list goes on)
- I hate the weird relationships she has (never call the tip of a penis crown again)
- I hate Mae’s non-existing personality (why did they chose poor Emma Watson in the movie???)
- I hate that this book has no chapters (Is it meant to be a circle with no ending or beginning?)
- I hate that character development is missing (she had so many chances to change her behavior), even though that’s the whole point of the book: she is supposed to represent the people blindly following a monopoly system
- I hate the fatphobia and the CONSTANT MANIPULATION, HELP
- I hate and love simultaneously that the plot is „just“ about the life at the company and how it takes over the world
- I am confused about the tension. I was sometimes bored to death because she was rendering about her „dumb friends (Mercer and Annie) and family (her parents). And in the next moment I wanted to know if we will ever get revenge on this entitled bitch and the inveterate circle
You see, I am enraged about this book and that’s the whole point, I believe. We have to understand that this book, even though it was published 10 years ago, is a mirror to today’s reality (have Google, Facebook and co in mind). Still you could have easily shortened the book by 100/200 pages.
Ps: thank you to my friend Nex for letting me buy this book from him :)
Graphic: Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Toxic relationship, Addiction, Forced institutionalization, Alcohol, Medical content, Body shaming, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship
Moderate: Car accident, Child abuse, Abandonment, Child death, and Colonisation