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A review by abibliophagist
The Hive by Barry Lyga, Morgan Baden
2.0
1.5 nearly DNF'd but I kept hoping it'd pull through.
I've had this on my shelf for nearly a year, I got it for myself as part of my birthday hall last year and as we quickly approach my bday and I was in a slump I figured why not.
The concept is solid and interesting, Black Mirror Esque, techno-thriller, and topical subject.
We follow Cassie, a teen who is the daughter of a famous hacker, in the age where the government has made it legal, purge style, for the masses to dole out punishment for social media posts with enough condemns. Cassie supports this until she's the one being hunted down.
This book had a lot of issues, the plot wasn't fully thought out, the characters were weak, the parody of society was too on the nose in a bad way, and unfortunately, Cassie is for sure in the running for most unlikable character ever. I don't have to like characters, heck some of my favorite stories are about unlikeable anti-heroes. But Cassie was literally the worst. From the beginning, she fights everyone, every single person, she's mean to everyone, for no reason beyond adults trying their darnedest to write teenage apathy. Even once the poo hits the fan, she questions and is mean to people who try and help her. To the point that it gets people literally killed.
She's in the situation in the first place because she decides to a fake friend the popular kids who egg her on to make a tasteless joke on Twitter. Then dip *insert surprised Pikachu face here*. Characters that you never see again, and honestly didn't need to exist, other than maybe to try and pass the blame off our super unlikable hero?
They weren't the only characters that didn't need to exist, as honestly nearly all the characters were so poorly fleshed out that they could be condensed, replaced, or cut completely without missing them. Mom? Does absolutely nothing except organize a mom protest that goes nowhere. Hacker dad? Honestly best character. But I can't help but wonder if it takes away from the message, would people bother to help Cassie if her dad wasn't famous? How many people have had to suffer the fate of hive justice because they didn't have a hacker dad that got you an in with an underground hacker movement? Underground hacker movement? What did they actually do in this book? Nothing, every big revelation was made by Cassie's mad skillz at hacking or was just told to her by insiders. Insider? Didn't do anything or tell her anything they didn't eventually figure out themselves. President? They tried so hard to write this guy in the cadence of Trump, funny at first, but then a caricature that just detracted from the whole thing. Do you want me to believe that no one saw the flaw in Hive Justice when a Trump-like guy would be the first one Hive justice would go for? The fact that he's still posting his idiotic things means there is an obvious flaw in the system. Red Dread, the random redhaired dreadlock rich boy, so confused by this character, he's there for a while and then the authors decided to just be done with him, so we were. Cute hacker boy, who dresses and acts like my nerdy friends in high school circa 2004? MIA 90% of the book, until he shows up, just to be Cassie's hype man, and then love interest? Literally, every character was so poorly thought out, utilized, and executed.
It doesn't stop with the characters, the plot is so full of holes that it was frustrating. I get that writing an episode of Black Mirror is probably hard. A lot goes into a scifi that's so near future and relevant. But it just felt like these authors had an idea and never bothered to really figure it out. They start to, the obvious like if this is legal then how is the government involved, how is it regulated, who runs it? They touch on these things but conveniently don't go in deep. They don't have to go in terribly deep, but deep enough to make me believe it, and I didn't believe it. In multiple places the characters act like some big reveal happened, stating things like "oh what a revelation" but no matter how I reread the paragraph, at no point was the thing explained, why it mattered, or how that changes things, it just states that it does. For example Also if legally you can kill someone with enough condemnation, what about people in the crossfire, if someone gets killed because someone else is a target, what are the laws around that? Not fleshed out well.
Honestly, the whole government conspiracy took away from the message for me, I hate to say it but I don't think we need government overreach to make the concept of hive justice a bad one. People are terrible, I think focusing on how people would manipulate the system is enough (they start the book like this and I really thought that's where it was going, but they had to make it the big bad government). I think the story would have been way more compelling if it showed how just some scorned teenagers could manipulate the system into a death sentence. What makes this worse is the "big revelation" is not used, it doesn't get Cassie out of her situation, she doesn't reveal it to anyone, and she doesn't use it to change anything. I think maybe the authors thought they were setting it up for a sequel but it didn't feel like it. The book acts like it gets her out of her situation, which is weird, even says it does a few times, but it doesn't, what gets her out of her situation is so beyond stupid
In the end, the end of her situation had nothing to do with her hacking skills, the underground network, the people along the way, or her famous dad. It's what the book should have focused on, the internet is mercurial. Hive justice wouldn't work cause punishment would be exponentially worse when things are new, but people will just get bored and move on. This should have been the point, but instead, they focused on a completely different thing, but then still ended it on the message that was staring them in the face the whole time.
This book was a hot mess. It ended with such an unbelievable little puff of air that I'm not sure what their intentions were, what the message was supposed to be, and where it would go if it had a sequel. They messed up that finale and rendered all the rest of the plot useless. I'm so baffled at how poorly put together that story was that I've lost my groove and don't even know how to finish this.
All in all, skip it and watch some Black Mirror.
I've had this on my shelf for nearly a year, I got it for myself as part of my birthday hall last year and as we quickly approach my bday and I was in a slump I figured why not.
The concept is solid and interesting, Black Mirror Esque, techno-thriller, and topical subject.
We follow Cassie, a teen who is the daughter of a famous hacker, in the age where the government has made it legal, purge style, for the masses to dole out punishment for social media posts with enough condemns. Cassie supports this until she's the one being hunted down.
This book had a lot of issues, the plot wasn't fully thought out, the characters were weak, the parody of society was too on the nose in a bad way, and unfortunately, Cassie is for sure in the running for most unlikable character ever. I don't have to like characters, heck some of my favorite stories are about unlikeable anti-heroes. But Cassie was literally the worst. From the beginning, she fights everyone, every single person, she's mean to everyone, for no reason beyond adults trying their darnedest to write teenage apathy. Even once the poo hits the fan, she questions and is mean to people who try and help her. To the point that it gets people literally killed.
She's in the situation in the first place because she decides to a fake friend the popular kids who egg her on to make a tasteless joke on Twitter. Then dip *insert surprised Pikachu face here*. Characters that you never see again, and honestly didn't need to exist, other than maybe to try and pass the blame off our super unlikable hero?
They weren't the only characters that didn't need to exist, as honestly nearly all the characters were so poorly fleshed out that they could be condensed, replaced, or cut completely without missing them. Mom? Does absolutely nothing except organize a mom protest that goes nowhere. Hacker dad? Honestly best character. But I can't help but wonder if it takes away from the message, would people bother to help Cassie if her dad wasn't famous? How many people have had to suffer the fate of hive justice because they didn't have a hacker dad that got you an in with an underground hacker movement? Underground hacker movement? What did they actually do in this book? Nothing, every big revelation was made by Cassie's mad skillz at hacking or was just told to her by insiders. Insider? Didn't do anything or tell her anything they didn't eventually figure out themselves. President? They tried so hard to write this guy in the cadence of Trump, funny at first, but then a caricature that just detracted from the whole thing. Do you want me to believe that no one saw the flaw in Hive Justice when a Trump-like guy would be the first one Hive justice would go for? The fact that he's still posting his idiotic things means there is an obvious flaw in the system. Red Dread, the random redhaired dreadlock rich boy, so confused by this character, he's there for a while and then the authors decided to just be done with him, so we were. Cute hacker boy, who dresses and acts like my nerdy friends in high school circa 2004? MIA 90% of the book, until he shows up, just to be Cassie's hype man, and then love interest? Literally, every character was so poorly thought out, utilized, and executed.
It doesn't stop with the characters, the plot is so full of holes that it was frustrating. I get that writing an episode of Black Mirror is probably hard. A lot goes into a scifi that's so near future and relevant. But it just felt like these authors had an idea and never bothered to really figure it out. They start to, the obvious like if this is legal then how is the government involved, how is it regulated, who runs it? They touch on these things but conveniently don't go in deep. They don't have to go in terribly deep, but deep enough to make me believe it, and I didn't believe it. In multiple places the characters act like some big reveal happened, stating things like "oh what a revelation" but no matter how I reread the paragraph, at no point was the thing explained, why it mattered, or how that changes things, it just states that it does. For example
Spoiler
when they confront the lady who helped make the hive, and the lady is like, we didn't expect apathy, like how does apathy affect this? How would that make it worse? Then later it turns out its ghost accounts, so once again, why would it matter if people are apathetic?Spoiler
what was the point of TonyStark without a statement on that???Honestly, the whole government conspiracy took away from the message for me, I hate to say it but I don't think we need government overreach to make the concept of hive justice a bad one. People are terrible, I think focusing on how people would manipulate the system is enough (they start the book like this and I really thought that's where it was going, but they had to make it the big bad government). I think the story would have been way more compelling if it showed how just some scorned teenagers could manipulate the system into a death sentence. What makes this worse is the "big revelation" is not used, it doesn't get Cassie out of her situation, she doesn't reveal it to anyone, and she doesn't use it to change anything. I think maybe the authors thought they were setting it up for a sequel but it didn't feel like it. The book acts like it gets her out of her situation, which is weird, even says it does a few times, but it doesn't, what gets her out of her situation is so beyond stupid
Spoiler
a two-sentence apology to the internet in which she shrugsIn the end, the end of her situation had nothing to do with her hacking skills, the underground network, the people along the way, or her famous dad. It's what the book should have focused on, the internet is mercurial. Hive justice wouldn't work cause punishment would be exponentially worse when things are new, but people will just get bored and move on. This should have been the point, but instead, they focused on a completely different thing, but then still ended it on the message that was staring them in the face the whole time.
This book was a hot mess. It ended with such an unbelievable little puff of air that I'm not sure what their intentions were, what the message was supposed to be, and where it would go if it had a sequel. They messed up that finale and rendered all the rest of the plot useless. I'm so baffled at how poorly put together that story was that I've lost my groove and don't even know how to finish this.
All in all, skip it and watch some Black Mirror.