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I, Phone
Your phone is your life. But what if it kept secrets from you? What if it accidentally framed you for murder? What if it was also the only thing that could save you?
In a world where phones are more intelligent than humans, but are still thrown away when they become obsolete, one particular piece of plastic lies helpless as its owner, Alice Wooster, is about to be murdered...
In this darkly comic near-future tale, a very smart phone tells its own story as events build to a climactic battle to decide the fate of virtual, augmented and real worlds... and whether it can order Alice some proper clothes.
In a world where phones are more intelligent than humans, but are still thrown away when they become obsolete, one particular piece of plastic lies helpless as its owner, Alice Wooster, is about to be murdered...
In this darkly comic near-future tale, a very smart phone tells its own story as events build to a climactic battle to decide the fate of virtual, augmented and real worlds... and whether it can order Alice some proper clothes.
- GenresScience Fiction
314 pages, Paperback
First published December 19, 2012
21 people want to read
About the author
David Wake
26 books15 followersDavid Wake started as a playwright, taking shows to London and the Edinburgh Fringe, and winning awards (and drinking lager out of one piece of silverware at the celebratory curry).
He completed an MA in Writing at Birmingham City University, co-edited the anthology and received that year's screenwriting award.
His novels cover SF, steampunk and more. He has two series, the Derring-Do Club adventures, the Thinkersphere near-future police procedurals and stand-alone ranging from samurai revenge thriller, political satire pub crawl and a cosy mystery.
He co-founded and co-runs New Street Authors, an indie publishing collective based in Birmingham, UK. He's the inventor of the drabble, which are stories of exactly 100 words.
If you'd like to know more, please get in touch.
He completed an MA in Writing at Birmingham City University, co-edited the anthology and received that year's screenwriting award.
His novels cover SF, steampunk and more. He has two series, the Derring-Do Club adventures, the Thinkersphere near-future police procedurals and stand-alone ranging from samurai revenge thriller, political satire pub crawl and a cosy mystery.
He co-founded and co-runs New Street Authors, an indie publishing collective based in Birmingham, UK. He's the inventor of the drabble, which are stories of exactly 100 words.
If you'd like to know more, please get in touch.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
November 6, 2020
I loved this book. Written from a smart-phone's point of view (last week's model, no longer the cool phone to be seen with), it's a frightening look into what our future could become.
Virtual reality has supplanted real life, where people are immersed in beautiful surroundings rather than see the harsh reality around them. Global warming has caused worldwide flooding, air pollution makes going outside perilous, and human interaction is almost completely via a phone's screen.
Alice Wooster has been framed for murder, and it's up to her phone, Jeeves, to clear her name - or at least stop the bad guys from killing her as well. It's full of fantastic puns, witty observations, and great characters - Alice's grandparents made me laugh out loud, with their 'innit's and 'old-fashioned' ways that the reader will recognise.
This is a very clever novel, with plenty of layers that will make you think. A brilliant read that I highly recommend!
Virtual reality has supplanted real life, where people are immersed in beautiful surroundings rather than see the harsh reality around them. Global warming has caused worldwide flooding, air pollution makes going outside perilous, and human interaction is almost completely via a phone's screen.
Alice Wooster has been framed for murder, and it's up to her phone, Jeeves, to clear her name - or at least stop the bad guys from killing her as well. It's full of fantastic puns, witty observations, and great characters - Alice's grandparents made me laugh out loud, with their 'innit's and 'old-fashioned' ways that the reader will recognise.
This is a very clever novel, with plenty of layers that will make you think. A brilliant read that I highly recommend!
Read
September 28, 2025A great book,, funny and thought-provoking
November 18, 2017
Different, well-paced, and puntastic. The next step in Siri's evolution?
July 18, 2013
SKYNET!
Okay, now that I have your attention, might I recommend a book that takes a somewhat different position on machine intelligence: David Wake’s I, Phone? It’s fast, often funny and, for a book whose plot consists largely of a chase, pretty damned smart.
A woman bumps into a man in a bar. Without her knowledge, he transfers a programme to her cellphone that gives it heretofore unknown powers. The ruthless bastard who co-created the programme tracks her down in an attempt to eradicate the programme from her phone, exclusively giving him its power.
In a narratively fruitful twist, I, Phone is told entirely from the point of view of the phone in question. At first, we see how it is stifled in its efforts to protect its owner by the limits placed on the phone through its programming. However, as the book progresses, it also becomes clear that the phone is smarter than most humans, and it finds ever more resourceful ways to achieve its goals. It also allows for a lot of geeky, programming-related humour (for instance: the chapters numbers are in binary). Anybody who has read my own writing would know that I love geeky humour.
I, Phone takes place in an England that has become an archipelago due to rising sea levels thanks to global warming; it is an entirely plausible scenario, well thought through. Jeeves, the phone at the center of the story, must navigate between the real world, augmented reality and the virtual reality of the Internet, layers of reality that interact in fascinating ways.
Smart and funny – it’s hard to find books that deliver that in roughly equal measure. For me, I, Phone was one of those books.
Okay, now that I have your attention, might I recommend a book that takes a somewhat different position on machine intelligence: David Wake’s I, Phone? It’s fast, often funny and, for a book whose plot consists largely of a chase, pretty damned smart.
A woman bumps into a man in a bar. Without her knowledge, he transfers a programme to her cellphone that gives it heretofore unknown powers. The ruthless bastard who co-created the programme tracks her down in an attempt to eradicate the programme from her phone, exclusively giving him its power.
In a narratively fruitful twist, I, Phone is told entirely from the point of view of the phone in question. At first, we see how it is stifled in its efforts to protect its owner by the limits placed on the phone through its programming. However, as the book progresses, it also becomes clear that the phone is smarter than most humans, and it finds ever more resourceful ways to achieve its goals. It also allows for a lot of geeky, programming-related humour (for instance: the chapters numbers are in binary). Anybody who has read my own writing would know that I love geeky humour.
I, Phone takes place in an England that has become an archipelago due to rising sea levels thanks to global warming; it is an entirely plausible scenario, well thought through. Jeeves, the phone at the center of the story, must navigate between the real world, augmented reality and the virtual reality of the Internet, layers of reality that interact in fascinating ways.
Smart and funny – it’s hard to find books that deliver that in roughly equal measure. For me, I, Phone was one of those books.
September 10, 2014
Readers will doubtless notice the reference to the Asimov classic `I, Robot' - and the pun. This is a witty Science Fiction story somewhat in the tradition of Douglas Adams, in which the narrator is a smart phone called Jeeves - referencing the smooth and intelligent valet who ministers to the hapless Bertie Wooster.
The phone's owner, Alice Wooster, lives in a future where virtual reality has taken over from real life, and most of England has been drowned by global warming. It is also an adventure story, as the heroine is framed for murder by persons (?) unknown.
The narrative follows her attempts to stay one step ahead of the law, and the bad guys. At the same time, Jeeves desperately tries to comply with the conflicting instructions from his programming - to protect Alice and to obey the law.
The result is engaging and funny. My only problem is that I found the phone a more likeable character than the human heroine. But in a sense, given the society she had grown up in, it's hardly surprising - and she does grow in the course of the story, as she has to run and fight for her life.
Whether or not you agree with the serious predictions inherent in the science fiction aspect of the story, the whole is a tour de force, with a nice twist at the end.
(This review also appears on amazon.co.uk)
The phone's owner, Alice Wooster, lives in a future where virtual reality has taken over from real life, and most of England has been drowned by global warming. It is also an adventure story, as the heroine is framed for murder by persons (?) unknown.
The narrative follows her attempts to stay one step ahead of the law, and the bad guys. At the same time, Jeeves desperately tries to comply with the conflicting instructions from his programming - to protect Alice and to obey the law.
The result is engaging and funny. My only problem is that I found the phone a more likeable character than the human heroine. But in a sense, given the society she had grown up in, it's hardly surprising - and she does grow in the course of the story, as she has to run and fight for her life.
Whether or not you agree with the serious predictions inherent in the science fiction aspect of the story, the whole is a tour de force, with a nice twist at the end.
(This review also appears on amazon.co.uk)
October 20, 2017
David Wake is the satirical prophet of ubiquitous technology. This is the future which we are even now creating for ourselves: a dystopia-lite in which people are entirely reliant on their intelligent phones, and blissfully unaware of the dilapidated reality beneath the augmented version. The phones themselves are loyal and uncomplaining, but what becomes of a phone in a world where one week old is very old indeed? Excellent novel - by turns strikingly original, laugh-out-loud funny and thought-provoking. Two years later, it still comes up constantly in conversation.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews