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caffeinatedkiwi's review
1.0
It tasted like fanfiction: It had traits like superficial characters with exaggerated mannerisms; a presumption that the reader already knows and cares about the characters, right from the start, so minimal explanations are given (or none at all); and the belief that it's okay to waste space with smart-alec back-and-forth conversations because the reader already feels like part of the in-crowd, so is pleased to be included in the pointless banter.
Not so. A pity, because I typically love A.I. stuff.
Not so. A pity, because I typically love A.I. stuff.
audiobook_addict's review
5.0
Excellent book. It's been a while since a scifi novel like this hooked me but it did. I can't wait to read the rest of the series.
bmacenlightened's review
4.0
I'll admit I devoured this book over the course of very little time because in the middle of all that horror I've been into I wanted to journey back into science fiction. This book held particular interest to me as a new graduate in a computer science program who has always been interested in the genres of cyberpunk and dystopian literature. I'll admit that at times there were parts that caught me and made me wonder if the editing was as perfect as I would expect, but it didn't take me out of the story on any real level.
The world itself is a concept that has been used in several books and universes that I've been familiar with, a utopian society that locks everyone else out, when really they're trying just as hard to keep people in. A world ravaged by all sorts of apocalyptic nastiness in combination with the strongest will in the world, that to survive.
The characters are a mixed bag, which in part might come from the fact that the book was relatively short and spent a lot of time centering on the different technological aspects of the world and less on the characters themselves. Gerry, the main character was someone who I found myself wavering in whether or not I could identify with him as his grasp on the situation seemed to change with the tides. Gabe was nearly two dimensional, and an obvious choice for what would occur later on, but his relationship with Petal, who was by far the best character and the one I found myself rooting for the most made his ultimate decisions seem like they came from left field rather than an easily deciphered plot device. Honestly I found there to be some good characterization in the secondary characters, such as Old Grey and Enna because over the duration that they were present in the story the author portrayed a lot of stuff about them and their motivations turning them into interesting characters.
The story itself was pretty good too, as it flowed from the main scenes of action into the next and so on, without too much time to lose the head of steam that it had before that point. I appreciated the fact that it portrayed the coding as some kind of legitimate wrestling match between minds and intelligences which is an image that I find myself seeing a lot of the time anyways when working on a program of my own. I just find myself wishing that perhaps some of it was fleshed out a little more, it almost whisked me around too fast to take note of all of the things that had happened. And of course with it being the first book in a trilogy the ending was suspect from the beginning and now from the outside looking in I know that it didn't fit where I wanted it to go. I understand that its nice to have it lead into the next book, and the ending is a cliffhanger by some form of the concept, but the maybe 20 pages that were between the climax and the ending seemed to do little other than tire me of the nuances in a situation that could've easily been portrayed in a montage scene without drawing it out. Still highly recommend however and will be looking into the next two in the series as I'm intrigued by the world and where the storyline will go following this opening portion.
The world itself is a concept that has been used in several books and universes that I've been familiar with, a utopian society that locks everyone else out, when really they're trying just as hard to keep people in. A world ravaged by all sorts of apocalyptic nastiness in combination with the strongest will in the world, that to survive.
The characters are a mixed bag, which in part might come from the fact that the book was relatively short and spent a lot of time centering on the different technological aspects of the world and less on the characters themselves. Gerry, the main character was someone who I found myself wavering in whether or not I could identify with him as his grasp on the situation seemed to change with the tides. Gabe was nearly two dimensional, and an obvious choice for what would occur later on, but his relationship with Petal, who was by far the best character and the one I found myself rooting for the most made his ultimate decisions seem like they came from left field rather than an easily deciphered plot device. Honestly I found there to be some good characterization in the secondary characters, such as Old Grey and Enna because over the duration that they were present in the story the author portrayed a lot of stuff about them and their motivations turning them into interesting characters.
The story itself was pretty good too, as it flowed from the main scenes of action into the next and so on, without too much time to lose the head of steam that it had before that point. I appreciated the fact that it portrayed the coding as some kind of legitimate wrestling match between minds and intelligences which is an image that I find myself seeing a lot of the time anyways when working on a program of my own. I just find myself wishing that perhaps some of it was fleshed out a little more, it almost whisked me around too fast to take note of all of the things that had happened. And of course with it being the first book in a trilogy the ending was suspect from the beginning and now from the outside looking in I know that it didn't fit where I wanted it to go. I understand that its nice to have it lead into the next book, and the ending is a cliffhanger by some form of the concept, but the maybe 20 pages that were between the climax and the ending seemed to do little other than tire me of the nuances in a situation that could've easily been portrayed in a montage scene without drawing it out. Still highly recommend however and will be looking into the next two in the series as I'm intrigued by the world and where the storyline will go following this opening portion.
stiricide's review
3.0
I'm realizing that I rate self published novels along a different metric than enterprise published novels. Probably because enterprise novels already have a baseline for editing/etc, so I don't usually have to get distracted by the writing for things like that.
Anyway, given that, Artificial Evil is pretty solid self published 3. No spelling or formatting errors (that I noticed), but it could stand a once over for consistency and tone. Things like the spelling of "mould," which, to its credit, was consistent throughout the novel, but made no sense within the larger content of the book. Characters magically appeared out of nowhere (most glaringly, the protagonist's mother lacks a name til it's casually dropped about 6 pages in to her existence, but in such a manner that it's assumed that we already know it.) Most of the characters lack any real interpersonal development - it's very obvious that Gerry and Petal are destined for some sort of romantic interest in each other, but it's danced around and never solidified until it's thrust in our face at the very end. Complicated plot dumps are also a hindrance, especially when they're dumped in the middle of key action sequences. And, of course, it comes with my number one complaint about self published kindle novels: it doesn't resolve. The final chapters very obviously build to an immediate sequel, introducing new characters and elements at a point where the book, if it were actually its own entity, would be resolving what we've spent the last 330 pages engaging in. Here, as everywhere, I find that to be a trite and misleading attempt to get readers to buy more material. (If you'd like to release a novel in sections, that's one thing, but please be upfront about the fact that your 3 part "series" is not, in fact, a series, so much as 3 parts of the same book.)
But the pacing is good, the story is interesting, and nothing about this novel is so completely unlikeable or uncouth as to render it unreadable. I know that doesn't sound like high praise, but for self published works, it can be.
All in all, I'd describe this as a sci-fi beach read. If anything, it's several steps above Confessions of a Shopaholic.
Postscript, apologies to Barnes for using this review and taking his work to task over issues that I have with most of the self publishing industry, not specifically his work. I think I threadjacked my own thread.
Anyway, given that, Artificial Evil is pretty solid self published 3. No spelling or formatting errors (that I noticed), but it could stand a once over for consistency and tone. Things like the spelling of "mould," which, to its credit, was consistent throughout the novel, but made no sense within the larger content of the book. Characters magically appeared out of nowhere (most glaringly, the protagonist's mother lacks a name til it's casually dropped about 6 pages in to her existence, but in such a manner that it's assumed that we already know it.) Most of the characters lack any real interpersonal development - it's very obvious that Gerry and Petal are destined for some sort of romantic interest in each other, but it's danced around and never solidified until it's thrust in our face at the very end. Complicated plot dumps are also a hindrance, especially when they're dumped in the middle of key action sequences. And, of course, it comes with my number one complaint about self published kindle novels: it doesn't resolve. The final chapters very obviously build to an immediate sequel, introducing new characters and elements at a point where the book, if it were actually its own entity, would be resolving what we've spent the last 330 pages engaging in. Here, as everywhere, I find that to be a trite and misleading attempt to get readers to buy more material. (If you'd like to release a novel in sections, that's one thing, but please be upfront about the fact that your 3 part "series" is not, in fact, a series, so much as 3 parts of the same book.)
But the pacing is good, the story is interesting, and nothing about this novel is so completely unlikeable or uncouth as to render it unreadable. I know that doesn't sound like high praise, but for self published works, it can be.
All in all, I'd describe this as a sci-fi beach read. If anything, it's several steps above Confessions of a Shopaholic.
Postscript, apologies to Barnes for using this review and taking his work to task over issues that I have with most of the self publishing industry, not specifically his work. I think I threadjacked my own thread.
bibliovino's review
1.0
Well I nearly pushed through and finished it. But the last chapter broke me. Not worth it.
tarabyt3's review
2.0
In theory, this book has the makings of everything I love: artificial intelligence, dystopia, the promise of a combination of religion and technology... But the third was never delivered, and the rest was really clunky. I spent the majority of the book going, "Really?" The action was too close together, too convenient, and too pat. I felt like the story was just bits of plot strung loosely together without enough support or connection. And the ending just... argh. I didn't like this one.
brittdelvalle's review
3.0
The story itself was great! I may even consider purchasing the next in its series. I rated this book three stars because of the numerous spelling and grammatical errors, of which made it difficult to read at times.
ms_m's review
4.0
This book was not what I was expecting. Really enjoyed it and will be looking for more stuff by this author in the future
thereaderofbooks's review
2.0
This book was ok. I dont fel the writing was outstanding and the story did not raise the book to higher standards. I felt this book had characters that were either not believable or very predictable. I probably will not continue reading the series.
astrologicalblues's review
3.0
(I have been given an copy of this book as an ebook through a giveaway on booklikes from the author in exchange for a fair review. I was not reimbursed or paid for this review.)
This story centers around a guy named Gerry Cardle who finds himself the winner of the lottery, which isn’t really worth much at all. It means that he has been chosen for his death and he only has a certain amount of time before he’s forced to ‘kick the hatchet’. This wasn’t supposed to happen, ever, especially since he’s one of the two people who helped program The Lottery in the first place. Once he’s forced off the grid, he travels with two friends to find the answer as to why this is all happening and slowly discovers that everything that he has known could potentially fall into pieces anytime soon.
This story has an interesting concept. It’s in the future where everyone is dependent on being wired. No one sticks to computers- it’s all in their bodies. Humans have been wired to program many things. If it’s anything like what Gerry does at the beginning of the chapter, they can also go into work by simply scanning the chip in their arm. It’s a very technological savvy world, but not everyone has their own tech in their bodies. Many live ‘off the grid’, so to speak, without what most humans have. They connect via wires to get what they need without attracting much attention.
This book could benefit to a better editor, if it did have one in the first place. It’s just over minor stuff, but there are mistakes that should have been taken care of already. The next issue I’ve had are the characters. Part of me loved Petal and how different she is. I mean, a girl who can store viruses without damage for a certain amount of time is a pretty impressive task I would imagine. But there has been many close calls with her that it just made me wonder if she actually just made it this long by luck. I have to admit- I didn’t really care much for Gerry either. It just seemed like that, with his ‘awesome’ skill, his intelligence just seemed really lacking to an irritating level.
Maybe one of the main issues, I think, is the organization of the story. There is a lot of information, which isn’t a bad thing. There is a lot of stuff in the book that I liked and found quite interesting. This book might actually be slightly better if it was longer just because, if it could be well thought-out and organized, it would benefit it in the long run in my opinion.
Overall, it’s an interesting book with an interesting concept, but due to the problems with it I just couldn’t really get into it as much as I wanted to and it frustrates me to think that I’m one of the rare people who think this way about this book, from what it seems. With that said, I would still recommend this book for those who love science fiction and are looking for something different.
This story centers around a guy named Gerry Cardle who finds himself the winner of the lottery, which isn’t really worth much at all. It means that he has been chosen for his death and he only has a certain amount of time before he’s forced to ‘kick the hatchet’. This wasn’t supposed to happen, ever, especially since he’s one of the two people who helped program The Lottery in the first place. Once he’s forced off the grid, he travels with two friends to find the answer as to why this is all happening and slowly discovers that everything that he has known could potentially fall into pieces anytime soon.
This story has an interesting concept. It’s in the future where everyone is dependent on being wired. No one sticks to computers- it’s all in their bodies. Humans have been wired to program many things. If it’s anything like what Gerry does at the beginning of the chapter, they can also go into work by simply scanning the chip in their arm. It’s a very technological savvy world, but not everyone has their own tech in their bodies. Many live ‘off the grid’, so to speak, without what most humans have. They connect via wires to get what they need without attracting much attention.
This book could benefit to a better editor, if it did have one in the first place. It’s just over minor stuff, but there are mistakes that should have been taken care of already. The next issue I’ve had are the characters. Part of me loved Petal and how different she is. I mean, a girl who can store viruses without damage for a certain amount of time is a pretty impressive task I would imagine. But there has been many close calls with her that it just made me wonder if she actually just made it this long by luck. I have to admit- I didn’t really care much for Gerry either. It just seemed like that, with his ‘awesome’ skill, his intelligence just seemed really lacking to an irritating level.
Maybe one of the main issues, I think, is the organization of the story. There is a lot of information, which isn’t a bad thing. There is a lot of stuff in the book that I liked and found quite interesting. This book might actually be slightly better if it was longer just because, if it could be well thought-out and organized, it would benefit it in the long run in my opinion.
Overall, it’s an interesting book with an interesting concept, but due to the problems with it I just couldn’t really get into it as much as I wanted to and it frustrates me to think that I’m one of the rare people who think this way about this book, from what it seems. With that said, I would still recommend this book for those who love science fiction and are looking for something different.