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alexaalyse's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
skycrane's review
2.0
It's odd that this book is called "Agency", since the main characters didn't have any. Verity and Netherton are constantly being told what to do, shuffled from one place to another, generally with no real idea of what they're doing, where they're going, or why. The protagonists of this story are Eunice, an experimental AI, and Lowbeer, returning from The Peripheral. They're the ones who face adversity and overcome it. But the book goes into very little detail about how that all happens. Most of the plot is the recounting of an elaborate scheme, set up by Eunice, to prevent Verity from being kidnapped. Numerous people are recruited to perform small roles in this task without any of them knowing the bigger picture. Well, not that many people, actually. The same half dozen just show up over and over again. Verity simply does what she's told without question, or with one question she endlessly repeats: "Where are we going?" Netherton is supposedly working for Lowbeer to facilitate her saving this world, but he's generally in the same position as Verity, just hanging out asking people where they're going.
In the background, there's a looming threat of nuclear war in Verity's world, Eunice's struggle to secretly acquire enough server space and processing power to survive being shut down by the military, and Lowbeer dealing with a threat to her position. But all of this is developed and resolved behind the scenes. The only characters we actually read about, all the people involved in helping Verity escape, are also just blindly following instructions from Eunice. The whole plot of this book is just a sideshow to the actual story, which is told without being told, and resolves itself through means not mentioned.
In the background, there's a looming threat of nuclear war in Verity's world, Eunice's struggle to secretly acquire enough server space and processing power to survive being shut down by the military, and Lowbeer dealing with a threat to her position. But all of this is developed and resolved behind the scenes. The only characters we actually read about, all the people involved in helping Verity escape, are also just blindly following instructions from Eunice. The whole plot of this book is just a sideshow to the actual story, which is told without being told, and resolves itself through means not mentioned.
julcoh's review
3.0
Look, Gibson is one of my favorite authors. Period. This one didn’t grab me like many of his previous novels.
I love the continued worldbuilding around the concept of stubs, the way inter-stub communication works, and the idea of Eunice as a hybrid AI building itself. The high-concept sci-fi bones of The Peripheral is still here, mixed with Gibsons’s speculative-fiction-of-the-present he’s honed since Pattern Recognition, but again this just didn’t grab me from a story perspective.
Without spoilers... I found some of the characters here absolutely overpowered, too much deus ex machina, and, ironically, a main character with very little agency of her own.
I love the continued worldbuilding around the concept of stubs, the way inter-stub communication works, and the idea of Eunice as a hybrid AI building itself. The high-concept sci-fi bones of The Peripheral is still here, mixed with Gibsons’s speculative-fiction-of-the-present he’s honed since Pattern Recognition, but again this just didn’t grab me from a story perspective.
Without spoilers... I found some of the characters here absolutely overpowered, too much deus ex machina, and, ironically, a main character with very little agency of her own.
socialamoebaemily's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Recommend! Not as good as The Peripheral but still definitely worth a read.
lillanaa's review
5.0
Agency was probably one of the better science fiction books I read this year, because it was grounded in reality. That may sound odd, but actually good science fiction that is about modern day should follow modern day. This was my only main issue with his first novel in the series, but I can mostly handwave it due to it being written about 5 years ago. A time when Facebook didn't consume us (as much, at least), and there were a lot different ideas about what the future may be. Agency, however, throws all of those notions away. The County seems like something that's a fever dream compared to the reality shown here, and I love it.
Verity is a well grounded protagonist, but she isn't really the protagonist of this one, once again. With this book focusing more on Wilf and things over in weird-future-England, I'm more than intrigued as to where this series is going to go; if there'll be another. Flynne and her crew are sort of back? We get moderate resolution on what happened to them from the epilogue of the previous book, and I'm fine with the way things happened there. Conner was one of my favourites, so I'm glad to see him have a larger role.
I'm now feeling oddly comfortable with Gibson's writing style, which isn't a bad thing by any stretch. As I said in his last review, the stakes don't seem as high because of his tendency towards happy endings, but I'm not disappointed by that. With the world we live in right now, we need something that ends on a high note. That said, though, that fact didn't weigh the book down at all. There were still moments of highs and lows, as there were in [b:The Peripheral|24611819|The Peripheral|William Gibson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1574084339l/24611819._SY75_.jpg|40167043], and this one I'd say was even better.
Verity is a well grounded protagonist, but she isn't really the protagonist of this one, once again. With this book focusing more on Wilf and things over in weird-future-England, I'm more than intrigued as to where this series is going to go; if there'll be another. Flynne and her crew are sort of back? We get moderate resolution on what happened to them from the epilogue of the previous book, and I'm fine with the way things happened there. Conner was one of my favourites, so I'm glad to see him have a larger role.
I'm now feeling oddly comfortable with Gibson's writing style, which isn't a bad thing by any stretch. As I said in his last review, the stakes don't seem as high because of his tendency towards happy endings, but I'm not disappointed by that. With the world we live in right now, we need something that ends on a high note. That said, though, that fact didn't weigh the book down at all. There were still moments of highs and lows, as there were in [b:The Peripheral|24611819|The Peripheral|William Gibson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1574084339l/24611819._SY75_.jpg|40167043], and this one I'd say was even better.
drood's review
adventurous
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
muddy_gardener's review against another edition
5.0
Classic Gibson. Trying not to gobble it too fast.