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Autonomous

Annalee Newitz (Goodreads Author)

3.59 · Rating details · 14,892 ratings · 2,150 reviews

Autonomous features a rakish female pharmaceutical pirate named Jack who traverses the world in her own submarine. A notorious anti-patent scientist who has styled herself as a Robin Hood heroine fighting to bring cheap drugs to the poor, Jack’s latest drug is leaving a trail of lethal overdoses across what used to be North America—a drug that compels people to become addi ...more

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Hardcover, 303 pages

Published September 19th 2017 by Tor Books

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Sep 26, 2017 Mary ~Ravager of Tomes~ rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2-star, year-2017

Jack has a history of aligning herself with rebel causes. She is pirate in the sense that she reverse engineers drugs and distributes them to the public for reasonable prices. When a stimulant begins to manifest deadly addiction, Jack sets out to try and bring down the manufacturer responsible for overlooking the side effects.

Having distributed a knockoff version of this drug, Jack finds an agent/bot duo, Eliasz & Paladin, hot on her tail.

So really, I must say the only area in which this book m ...more

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Apr 05, 2018 Wil Wheaton rated it really liked it

Shelves: sci-fi, hackers

I loved this. It did for AI and Patents and Biotech what Neuromancer and Snowcrash did for the Internet. The stuff I loved the most is all spoiler-y, so I'll just say that there are two competing narrative characters, who are at clear odds with each other, and each is the villain in the other's story. The thing that Annalee Newitz does so well (and she does everything well in this book) is to make each of these characters not only the hero of their own story, but to allow us to identify with the ...more

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Dec 03, 2017 Lena rated it it was ok

Shelves: science-fiction, audio

Man: Hey Blue Bot, you’re looking good.

Blue Bot notices Man’s erection.
Blue Bot: Did you want to have sex?

Man: No! I’m not gay!

Blue Bot researches humans on the internet. Blue Bot replaces its blue carapace with a pink one.

Man: You’re pink?!?! Why are you pink?

Pink Bot: I decided this was me. Do you want to have sex?

Man: Yes!

After sex.
Man: Did you enjoy that?

Pink Bot: I enjoyed that you enjoyed it.

Man: I knew you were a woman.

The best I can say about this book is that it reminded me of Malka Old ...more

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Jul 29, 2017 Justine rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2017-read, favourites-2017

This is a book that you are either going to love or just not get. Newitz has painted a pretty grim picture of the future, similar to that portrayed in Company Town by Madeline Ashby and in After Atlas by Emma Newman. What all three of these books have in common is a future where people are basically commodities, like everything else, and the division between the haves and have-nots has grown as much as we can imagine.

Newitz provides a wonderful story for exploring the nature of autonomy, or free This is a book that you are either going to love or just not get. Newitz has painted a pretty grim picture of the future, similar to that portrayed in Company Town by Madeline Ashby and in After Atlas by Emma Newman. What all three of these books have in common is a future where people are basically commodities, like everything else, and the division between the haves and have-nots has grown as much as we can imagine.

Newitz provides a wonderful story for exploring the nature of autonomy, or freedom. Freedom not only for the AIs, or sentient bots, in the story but also for the humans, who are equally subject to laws of indenture. I loved following Jack's tale, her evolution from idealist scientist, to attempted reformist within the law, moving ultimately to pharmaceutical piracy. It is such a timely question really - when faced with injustice, is it better to work within the bounds of the law, or to take matters into your own hands and do what is required to help people regardless of the consequences? Jack's story is one of a kind of vigilante justice, recognizing that even vigilantes have to make a living and pay the bills somehow.

The parallel story of the property police after her, a militant officer named Eliasz and his military grade bot Paladin, is equally compelling. Eliasz is clearly damaged, and filled with fervour for his cause, but the reason for this is initially unclear. Paladin is a newly created bot, filled with questions about his/her identity, feelings, role, future, and past. Following the two of them, watching their relationship deepen and develop, seeing their relentless pursuit of Jack, is strange and at times terrifying, but also ultimately hopeful.

I suppose I can see why some people would not like this book. It does pose some disturbing questions and paints a very grim picture of a future even more defined by property rights and corporate might than we have today. Despite some brutal and violent scenes, it also shows some people and sentient machines working together for a better and more hopeful future. If you liked the other two books I mentioned above, or are curious about them, then I would put this one on your reading list as well. For me, Autonomous is going on my favourites shelf for 2017. ...more

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Feb 16, 2018 Philip rated it liked it

Shelves: author-woman, 2017-releases, sci-fi

3.5ish stars.

An interesting, well-written, near-ish-future SF novel with some compelling ideas. It reminds me a little bit of Malka Older's idea heavy Infomocracy, although I liked Older's book a little bit more.

I didn't find this extremely engaging and never felt strongly pressed to continue reading, but I did enjoy it consistently. The ideas outshine the characters, and I didn't connect with any of them except for Paladin, an indentured robot working toward "autonomy," and, to a lesser extent 3.5ish stars.

An interesting, well-written, near-ish-future SF novel with some compelling ideas. It reminds me a little bit of Malka Older's idea heavy Infomocracy, although I liked Older's book a little bit more.

I didn't find this extremely engaging and never felt strongly pressed to continue reading, but I did enjoy it consistently. The ideas outshine the characters, and I didn't connect with any of them except for Paladin, an indentured robot working toward "autonomy," and, to a lesser extent, Threezed, an indentured human experiencing autonomy for the first time.

Newitz also explores sexuality/gender identity in some different ways, while not making them a direct focus of the narrative - for example, Paladin is a genderless robot whose human partner, Eliasz, projects his own expectations, desires, and ultimately his suppressed homophobia, onto Paladin. Paladin takes it, and even allows Eliasz to change the pronoun he uses for Paladin from “he” to “she” just to appease him (Paladin, being genderless, doesn’t care, but wants Eliasz, who is sexually attracted to Paladin but doesn’t want to be a “faggot,” to be comfortable). Obviously an icky situation, and Newitz obviously does not try to present it as a healthy representation of gender identity because that's obviously not the point she's making, and not all characters in literature are saints. Newitz shows that Paladin has the right to choose how to handle, and ultimately learn from, the relationships presented, which I appreciate, even if it's not resolved like a Becky Chambers novel. Others have expressed discomfort with the inclusion of this particular aspect of the novel, and though I can't speak to it from the perspective of an LGBT+ individual, Newitz herself is a member of the community (her partner is Charlie Jane Anders, a trans woman, and talented author of All the Birds in the Sky), meaning, if nothing else, that she has a distinct frame of reference that I respect. Just a reminder that having a homophobic character in a book does not mean the book or its author are homophobic any more than a book involving a murderer means the book or its author is condoning of murder (this book has its fair share of that as well).

Some of the focal subject matters of the book are property rights, economics, and Big Pharma, which are not really of huge interest to me, but I respect it as well-written and worthy of the praise it's received.

Posted in Mr. Philip's Library ...more

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Oct 13, 2017 Bradley rated it it was amazing

Shelves: worldbuilding-sf, 2017-shelf, sci-fi

Pirates and bounty hunters on the high chemical and electronic frontier! Add a bit of transgendered robot issues, a bit of do-gooder pharmaceutical mayhem, and time split between labs, parties, sexual repression, and a few really big questions explored deftly and interestingly, and we've got ourselves a very interesting SF.

Let's look at the top layer a little. Slavery issues. The novel takes them on for both robots and humans equally. I'd expected that from both the blurb and the cover, of cours ...more

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Sep 26, 2017 Kaylin (The Re-Read Queen) rated it it was ok

Shelves: didn-t-finish, sci-fi

DNF @ 38%

This is marketed as a robin hood esque tale, featuring Jack sneaking pharmaceuticals to the poor and dodging the authorities. Two of those said authorities are Paladin and Elias, a military robot with a human processor and their handler, who chase Jack and develop feelings for each other.

While all that's technically true, there's no emotional impact with any of this. We are thrust into a story without any feel for the character's or the world. Jack hardly has a noble quest to deliver m ...more

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Oct 14, 2017 Mogsy (MMOGC) rated it it was ok

Shelves: review-copy, science-fiction, audiobook, pirates

2.5 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum https://bibliosanctum.com/2017/10/19/...

I’m not having much luck with books this month. Autonomous was another highly anticipated sci-fi title that sounded very good from its premise, but ended up fizzling when the story fell short on the follow-through. Featuring a bold and daring female pharmaceutical pirate who makes a living bootlegging high-priced upmarket drugs in order to help the poor, I thought for sure this would be a winner, but ultimately neither t 2.5 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum https://bibliosanctum.com/2017/10/19/...

I’m not having much luck with books this month. Autonomous was another highly anticipated sci-fi title that sounded very good from its premise, but ended up fizzling when the story fell short on the follow-through. Featuring a bold and daring female pharmaceutical pirate who makes a living bootlegging high-priced upmarket drugs in order to help the poor, I thought for sure this would be a winner, but ultimately neither the characters nor the plot turned out to be what I expected.

Meet Jack Chen, an anti-patent scientist who travels around the world in her submarine. Through reverse engineering, she is able to reproduce the most expensive drugs and make them widely available to those who can’t afford them, though her latest project appears to have hit a snag. The drug in question is Zacuity, which is supposed to increase productivity levels by making the subject feel good about work, making it a must-have for anyone hoping to remain competitive in the job market. However, a string of recent reports about people addicted to their jobs—to the point of insanity or even death—has gotten Jack a little worried. Horrified at the idea that her bootlegged drugs could have led to these lethal overdoses, she decides to do some investigating of her own. Before she can get far though, she is alerted to an intrusion on her submarine, leading her to meet a young indentured slave named Threezed who had stowed away along with his master in an attempt to steal Jack’s merchandise.

Meanwhile, the makers of Zacuity are also aware that the drug might be behind these tragic incidents, and they have plenty of reasons to keep the public from finding out that they are complicit. Since Jack’s pirating activities and efforts to find an antidote have been threatening to bring all of this crumbling down, they’ve hired a couple of agents from the International Property Coalition to take care of her and all the evidence. The two IPC operatives tasked to do this—a human named Eliasz partnered with a recently activated indentured military bot named Paladin—waste no time combing through Jack’s shadowy history for any clues that would help them track her down, and in time their work together gradually develops into a deeper emotional and physical closeness.

Autonomous gets us off to a good start, introducing a dystopian-like world in which nation states have all but disappeared, replaced by economic zones dominated by mega-corporations. As a Robin Hood-esque protagonist who targets drug companies to help the downtrodden, Jack Chen was someone I took an immediate liking to, and the fact that she smuggles her pirated pharmaceuticals in a badass submarine certainly didn’t hurt. Furthermore, when the addictive side effects of Zacuity came to light, they were at once so horrifying but so fascinating that I just couldn’t help but be drawn deeper into the story’s premise.

Unfortunately, that enthusiasm didn’t last. After a promising intro, the plot begins to fray around its narrative edges, abandoning the intrigue and suspense in favor of Jack’s relationship engagements and bedroom dalliances, both in her past and present. Granted, the author also attempts to weave in important societal messages and themes amidst all the drama, exploring everything from the exploitative practices of big pharmaceutical companies and their drug patents to the issues surrounding a commercial society that considers both sentient robots and humans as nothing more than chattel.

Indeed, there are a variety of relevant and topical discussions to chew on here, ranging from autonomy and free will to individual identity and gender roles. It’s all very interesting too, despite this story turning out completely different from what I’d expected based on the publisher description. Had the ideas been better executed, I might even have enjoyed it more, but in the end I get the sense this book is nowhere near as clever as it thinks it is. Any points it was trying to make were either garbled or lost in the sea of noise, and no other aspect of this story illustrates this better than the relationships between Eliasz and Paladin/Jack and Threezed. There are obviously parallels between the two, but if there’s supposed to be a takeaway here about the complicated power dynamics and the role of gender construct in matters of sex and romance, I’m not sure it got through very well, coming across as rather awkward and insufficient compared to other books that have tackled these topics.

I really wanted to like Autonomous—especially following a recent string of disappointing reads, I was really hoping for a good one—but what began with a great premise bolstered by some clever and interesting ideas ultimately became a dull and lifeless affair. That said, my patience is not the best these days and it’s possible my mood was a factor in my experience. Hopefully others picking this up will have a better time than I did.

Audiobook Comments: Jennifer Ikeda is familiar narrator to me, and I’ve enjoyed a lot of her performances in the past. It’s a shame I didn’t like Autonomous better, but I could find no fault in terms of her narration or quality of the audiobook production itself. I definitely would not overlook the audiobook edition if you prefer this format. ...more

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Sep 11, 2017 Avery Delany rated it did not like it

Shelves: 2017-reads, lgbtq, ya, why-did-i-inflict-this-upon-myself, dystopia-utopia, arcs

As a trans reader, I am really angry and upset with this book due to its homophobia and transphobia. *This book was received through NetGalley for free in exchange for an honest review*

Autonomous was one of my most anticipated reads of Autumn 2017 and I was ecstatic when I received a copy on NetGalley to read for free in exchange for a review. To some extent, Autonomous did not disappoint and yet, to another extent, Autonomous is downright homophobic and transphobic.

Let’s start off with what’ ...more

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Nov 17, 2017 Gary rated it really liked it

Autonomous is the excellent debut novel from lauded science journalist Annalee Newitz. Set in the year 2144, Jack makes her living pirating pharmaceuticals to help people who can’t afford life-saving medication. To pay the bills, she also pirates drugs like Zacuity, a kind of legal speed that is supposed to help people focus at work. She discovers too late that Zaxy, the makers of Zacuity, failed to disclose evidence of potentially deadly side effects that are magnified in people using her pirat ...more

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Aug 02, 2017 Joel rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2017

It would be hard for any book to live up to superlative cover blurbs from William Gibson and Neal Stephenson, but Annalee Newitz comes damn close with her debut, which is as much about the future of medical ethics and big pharma as it is the awakening of a fascinating artificial consciousness. (It's also a stealth romance novel—maybe the strangest, most oddly affecting I've ever encountered.) ...more

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Apr 24, 2019 K.J. Charles added it

Shelves: sci-fi

This was odd. Raises a lot of questions about autonomy, freedom, moral responsibility, and especially gender, but doesn't really address them once raised. eg this is a society based on bots when AI is sufficient to give them individual consciousness, and the question of autonomy is explored quite a lot there, but it's also based on indenture, where by people can sell themselves *or other people* into slavery, which is barely tackled at all. The narrative's assumption is that human slavery is alw This was odd. Raises a lot of questions about autonomy, freedom, moral responsibility, and especially gender, but doesn't really address them once raised. eg this is a society based on bots when AI is sufficient to give them individual consciousness, and the question of autonomy is explored quite a lot there, but it's also based on indenture, where by people can sell themselves *or other people* into slavery, which is barely tackled at all. The narrative's assumption is that human slavery is always wrong, but the social decision to reintroduce a legal human slavery system when bots are well established is glossed over in two lines, and made no sense to me. (The cast is mostly POC including the enslaved character; race is not addressed.)

Equally, there is a major plot strand about a soldier and his military bot. Bot is ungendered because, er, robot; soldier sees bot as male because military; soldier is sexually attracted to bot but has massive homophobia; bot IDs as female to please him; soldier is then happy to embark on a love affair with her; bot remains ungendered in own consciousness. I'm pretty sure this is meant to be a consideration of the absurdity of how people deal with gender, in that the soldier is happy to be having sex with a walking metal weapon as long as he can apply the pronoun "she". (And I don't think this is intended to say anything about transness although you might well feel it does anyway.) But it's hard to tell because the soldier's homophobia is never addressed, nor is his attitude to gender examined, nor does the bot reach any conclusions, nor do we address the question of someone adopting a specific gender identity to satisfy someone else's desire, which is...quite large.

Plus the soldier and bot are brutal torturers and murderers in the service of an evil corporation and utterly amoral, yet we're presented their love story as the main emotional heart of the book and the soldier is shown to be passionate about autonomy and morals when it comes to enslaved children, and that contrast isn't addressed either.

Basically, the author seems to have made a conscious decision to present a whole lot of chewy ideas and then not to chew on them. We don't dig into/engage with it, morally or emotionally. Maybe that's so the reader can draw their own conclusions, maybe the author doesn't feel there are conclusions to be reached, but in the end the lack of engagement left me unsatisfied. Though I obviously had a lot to think and say about it, so there you are. ...more

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Oct 23, 2019 Monica rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audio, kindle_scifi_fan, pub_2010s, did-not-like, female-author-fic, scifi-earth, scifi-dystopia, wh_fem_fic

Well…ummm…just uh…hmmm. At first blush this one almost had me convinced that it had poignancy. Chalked full of meaning and depth. The longer I thought about it, the harder it was to find importance. Just a smidgen.

OMG, who am I kidding? I tried, goodness I tried to find the substance in this superficial sci fi fluffy candy with hard, sharp edges. Frankly, it is beyond my ability. Pharmaceutical companies have found dominance in this near future landscape and Jack is a pirate who reverse enginee Well…ummm…just uh…hmmm. At first blush this one almost had me convinced that it had poignancy. Chalked full of meaning and depth. The longer I thought about it, the harder it was to find importance. Just a smidgen.

OMG, who am I kidding? I tried, goodness I tried to find the substance in this superficial sci fi fluffy candy with hard, sharp edges. Frankly, it is beyond my ability. Pharmaceutical companies have found dominance in this near future landscape and Jack is a pirate who reverse engineers drugs so that they can be produced at a lower cost and sold to the poor and free clinics. Problem is that a very expensive drug that she reverse engineered basically kills people by working too well. Government and authority structures of course blame the pirate and thus is the plot. The novel becomes a chase with some flashbacks about why Jack became a pirate. Intersperse the personal dynamics in this world where a variety of characters are robots and super intelligent AIs, partially organic machines, and humans who are indentured adding a separate layer of oppression. When they have done their time in servitude they become Autonomous hence the title. Humans are born Autonomous, robots, machines and AIs must use an Autonomous key to become completely self-aware and self-reliant. Interesting concepts. The reach far far far exceeded the grasp. Triple far!!

Miss #1: Unsympathetic characters both human and non-human. Did not like or feel for a single character. Not one.

Miss #2: There was just a terrible attempt to describe an awakening of emotion/sentience in AI's. She tries to do it by making a robot fall in love and to do it in such a way that it notices and is trying to detail every moment of the awakening. Here Newitz is trying trying trying to be poignant and meaningful and deep and it ssssttrrrrrreeeettttcccchhhheeeessss credulity. The ending was just… Nope.

Miss #3 The sex. My goodness the sex. Honestly for me it was not organic, didn't add to the story and for the most part was almost completely gratuitous and salacious. The attempt at sexual intimacy culminated with multiple encounters between a homophobic human male and his non-gendered AI whom he has dubbed a female and declared undying love. Jack the pirate is sexually fluid sleeping with a variety of genders et al. I guess the next century is full of trisexuals. Try anything. It found it disappointing and uninspired. The treatment of sex in the novel came across to me as juvenile. Again, just…no.

I think there are concepts in the novel that were fascinating. The sociological aspects and how Newitz extrapolated corporations, the government (complicit), AIs, a civilization where indentured servitude is the currency, how sexuality in the future was more accepting (except the stereotypical homophobe who was a cliched authoritarian). Also there is some really interesting science and technology. But on the whole, for me this just wasn't very good. It's been a few years since I've disliked a book. I guess I was due...

2.75 Stars

Listened to the audio book. The narration by Jennifer Ikeda was very good but it could not overcome the material. ...more

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Sep 07, 2017 Lindsay rated it it was amazing

A breathtakingly well-imagined tour of Earth in the mid-twenty-second century where climate change has progressed to the point that the arctic is the new frontier for development and robotics, nanotech and biotech have reshaped our societies. Governments now come a distant second to powerful corporations and the International Property Coalition (IPC) acts with unchallenged lethal force to protect property rights. and both humans and robots can be indentured as slaves.

Pharmaceutical patent pirate A breathtakingly well-imagined tour of Earth in the mid-twenty-second century where climate change has progressed to the point that the arctic is the new frontier for development and robotics, nanotech and biotech have reshaped our societies. Governments now come a distant second to powerful corporations and the International Property Coalition (IPC) acts with unchallenged lethal force to protect property rights. and both humans and robots can be indentured as slaves.

Pharmaceutical patent pirate Jack runs afoul of the IPC when a drug that she has reverse-engineered from one of the major corporates is linked to a string of deaths. As she struggles to survive against the forces hunting her, she needs to come up with a solution for the problem that she has caused while showing that the corporation that she pirated the drug from is responsible for the element that makes it deadly. As we get Jack's story and back story, we also follow two IPC agents, the human Elias and his new partner military robot Paladin and their extremely odd relationship.

This story was amazing and one of the best futurist pieces I've read, neatly extrapolating political, technological and social trends to a future that in places seems like a dystopian hell and in others as a form of utopia where nearly everything can be cured and long youthful life is a reality. It all comes across feeling very ordinary to the people living in it though. Jack's point of view is an interesting one as an outsider explicitly opposed to some of the worst elements of this society, but Paladin's point of view is the most fascinating. AI characters are usually quite interesting and are something of a fashion in SF at the moment. I would put this portrayal up among the best of them at the moment including All Systems Red and Illuminae.

The characters are great, the science fiction is great and the density of ideas and ruthlessly thought-out world building is incredible. A fantastic debut and among the best novels of the year for me. ...more

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Sep 18, 2017 Peter Tillman rated it it was amazing

Shelves: at-slo-pa, prob-won-t-read, science-fiction, reread-list

Great, geeky hard-SF exploration of tech-aided transhumanity, and how it brought slavery back into fashion. A timely cautionary tale on the fragility of civil liberties. There are a few first-novel rough spots, and a slightly creepy ending. Overall, 4.5+ stars, rounded up

One of my mental tests of any hard-sf novel is, has the writer done her homework? Nobody can write intelligently about a topic like this without reading the prior art, and without some basic grasp of what's going on in the rele ...more

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Oct 10, 2017 Julie rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: futuristic, borrowed-from-library, lgbtqa, non-white-mc, chronology-back-and-forthing, non-western-setting, cyberpunk, artificial-intelligence, nebula-awards-2018

Hmm, let's see if I can write a coherent review to figure out some of my issues with this book! This pairs very well with Madeline Ashby's Company Town, in terms of being a speculative futuristic cyberpunky novel starring a female Asian lead, largely set in Canada, and interested in issues of slavery, bodily autonomy, body mods, and sustainability. I love that we're getting these fresh new takes on what the future might look like; they're extensions of what we're seeing today, especially with th ...more

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Sep 24, 2017 Zach rated it did not like it

Newlitz is clearly relying on the networking goodwill she and partner Charlie Jane Anders have built during their time on io9.com to drum up hype and the usual uncritical, breathless praise from undemanding readers and those who form a part of a community that feels the need to support an author beyond the quality of the work in question.

After experiencing extreme disappointment over the marketing blitz for Ander's All the Birds in the Sky and the complete failure of the book itself to live up Newlitz is clearly relying on the networking goodwill she and partner Charlie Jane Anders have built during their time on io9.com to drum up hype and the usual uncritical, breathless praise from undemanding readers and those who form a part of a community that feels the need to support an author beyond the quality of the work in question.

After experiencing extreme disappointment over the marketing blitz for Ander's All the Birds in the Sky and the complete failure of the book itself to live up to the hype, I made a decision not to read Autonomous. My resolve was partially broken after reading a blurb from Neal Stephenson on the front cover: "Autonomous is to biotech and AI what Neuromancer was to the Internet."

Neal Stephenson, author of Snowcrash, the seminal cyberpunk novel of the 90s, is comparing Autonomous to Neuromancer, THE cyberpunk novel that birthed an entire genre? Ok, now you have my attention.

That intrigued me, so I decided to give Autonomous a chance. Three chapters in, it was obvious that Neal had engaged in some serious hyperbole and my disappointment and frustration reached a point where I did what I rarely do...I put the book to the side and decided not to continue reading.

Boring dialogue, generic descriptions, yawn-inducing action, unbelievable sequences of events—a robot has its arm shot off by its trainer and shortly thereafter the trainer refabricates the arm in some sort of 3d printer that apparently is programmed to output the myriad of complex mechanical and electronic elements one would expect to find part of a robotic arm and hand, and does so in a matter of a few minutes—most of the boxes you expect to see checked in the "don't do this" chapter of a writing guide seemed to show up within the first 20-30 pages.

Is it fair to give this book one star? Maybe not, since I haven't finished it. But the marketing hype suffers from some serious truth-in-advertisingitis, and I am tired of seeing authors or other creators get attention based on their connections and publishing deals. ...more

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Oct 11, 2017 Amanda rated it it was amazing

This is a dark, grim future. It is also an outstanding book that deals with complicated issues like autonomy, freedom and gender constructs. One of my favorites this year.

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Sep 25, 2017 Mel rated it it was ok

This review contains spoilers.

I have quite the contradicting thoughts on this book.

The premise is very interesting and innovative. The main theme of freedom versus ownership is comprehensibly written into the world with its patents and ownership (of medicine) as well as into the characters who are in different stages of freedom and ownership themselves. However, even as an autonomous person freedom is not a given. The questions the author raises in her book are important and thoroughly depicted. ...more

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Sep 20, 2017 Rachel (Kalanadi) rated it really liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, publisher

Video version of this review: https://youtu.be/5sDMuuc-9t0

Autonomous begins when Jack, a pharmaceutical pirate, discovers a stowaway on her submarine. Said stowaway is trying to steal her pirated drugs, so she kills him... and then is saddled with his very poorly treated indentured slave, Threezed. Then she finds out about a drug epidemic... caused by a work productivity drug she pirated and spread, which is now causing people to work themselves to death.

So, Jack wants to fix this problem. And s ...more

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Jun 29, 2018 Silvana rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Silvana by: Jonathan Strahan

Shelves: z-sff-2018-reading-challenge, female-nonbinary-authors, mine-mine-mine, reading-with-friends, poc-diaspora-authors, z-sff-2018-standalone-challenge, sci-fi, kindle-google, coode-street-recs, stand-alones

Update:
Just met Annalee in Swedish Con and got their autograph. They were super smart and sweet!

Original review:
Thank you, Coode Street Podcast, for this amazing recommendation. I first noticed Autonomous from Gary and Jonathan's convo, where they basically gushed about this book. Then one day, they interviewed Newitz. I was sold. It seemed to be a promising cyberpunk, which is a genre that I try to provide a second chance to, following my first bad experience with Neuromancer (which I did fina Update:
Just met Annalee in Swedish Con and got their autograph. They were super smart and sweet!

Original review:
Thank you, Coode Street Podcast, for this amazing recommendation. I first noticed Autonomous from Gary and Jonathan's convo, where they basically gushed about this book. Then one day, they interviewed Newitz. I was sold. It seemed to be a promising cyberpunk, which is a genre that I try to provide a second chance to, following my first bad experience with Neuromancer (which I did finally finished in the second attempt!)

I liked it more than I expected. In just 300 pages (give or take), they managed to include 1) evil patent-grabbing corporate, and 2) the problem of robot/human autonomy/indenture. I am enjoying the angle of corporate takeover is coming from the super powerful pharma companies (they are already very powerful nowadays), in which advanced pharma products can bring longer life and nearly permanent youth, but harshly enforced patents just made class division even worse since only the wealthy could afford those products.

Scary products those were. Annalee revealed that they had an awful experience with performance enhancing drug during a WorldCon and had to spend an interview shaking like hell due to the side effect.

In this novel, the world-building was believable with the eroding nation-states and the established special economic zones where countries got merged into one regional union. Well, if ASEAN could not be a supranational entity like the EU, maybe it will someday. Anyway, there are also a lot of unsettling details, like when they use dead people's data (including faces) from Facebook to construct androids.

This book, I warn you, can make the readers very uncomfortable. No, I'm not talking about rape, but there were some scenes that forced you to expand your understanding and expectation on gender, power, and sexual relations. Let's just leave it at that. What I love about this book, though, is that the author did explain the whys.

The book is pretty straightforward and nicely packed. Really, among all the SFF doorstoppers nowadays, you almost have to always rely on novellas if you want to enjoy a shorter work. Thanks Annalee, and all other 300-page stand alone novel authors! ...more

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Jun 08, 2021 Starlah rated it really liked it

Shelves: queer, 2021, sci-fi

This book was an interesting and fascinating exploration of the nature of autonomy.

“But now we know there has been no one great disaster—only the slow-motion disaster of capitalism converting every living thing and idea into property.”
- Annalee Newitz, Autonomous

2144, Captain Jack is known as a pharmaceutical pirate, though in actuality, she is more like Robin Hood in the way she reverse engineers medications to create generic versions and gets them out to the public; to those who couldn't o ...more

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Jan 03, 2021 Jemppu rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2021-alphabet-challenge

Autonomy, gender and drug issues. 'Autonomous' raises compelling topics, but handles them dubiously and/or leaves them hanging with an unrewarding fade out.

With its heart in the right place, it's a pity the story settles to operate on certain lazily conceptualized ideas based on unappealingly narrow principles; play-acting its tired contemporary cultural complications in a rather unconvincingly staged future setting.

(Its arguably most cogent case presented in a brief moment of self-reflection, o ...more

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Apr 07, 2019 Dawn F rated it it was ok

Shelves: media-audible

There were many interesting things and situations in this book that grabbed me. The relationship between humans and robots has always fascinated me, and I liked the very straight forward plot mingled with personal development and self discovery (I’m being purposely vague).

But there were just as many solutions and conclusions to the issues presented in the book that rubbed me the wrong way. I *get* what the author was trying to do (if there was a plan), but I felt the solution was a cop-out and d ...more

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Nov 09, 2017 RG rated it liked it

Alot happening in this novel. I normally love character driven stories, but I felt the relationship between Eliasz and Paladin was a little forced. I enjoyed Jacks character but wasnt overly involved. Pace was slow at times and a little random, at stages I felt the author was confused as to where to take the story. Solid world buidling if a little hazy at times. Strange way to end but I guess thats the direction she was going for. Still enjoyed the scifi elements.

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Oct 15, 2017 Elle (ellexamines) marked it as zzzzz-coverporn-etc

...well. I have to admit, I'm a bit disappointed. I was somewhat enjoying this for a time. While I found this book slow-moving and everything up to the climax a little boring, I was hoping for some more plot development and enjoying Jack's character. But I'm put off by one relationship I felt was unhealthy and heavily disliked. Be warned there are spoilers ahead.

At one point, a character (Paladin) who has up to this point identified with male pronouns changes pronouns partially to appease a rom ...more

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Dec 05, 2017 Kara Babcock rated it liked it

Shelves: 2017-read, artificial-intelligence, science-fiction, own, romance

You have to watch out for those robots. Never know when they might develop thoughts of their own. Or sexual orientations, kinks, and an understanding of the way humans misunderstand them.

Autonomous plumbs the depths of humanity through split narration. Annalee Newitz follows a very human, and very flawed, anti-patent crusader and a pair of patent-enforcement agents, one of whom is a self-aware robot just starting out. As the two stories unfold, so too does Newitz’s vision of a 22nd-century Earth ...more

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Jan 04, 2018 David rated it liked it

It's an exploration of big pharma, corporate rule, love, ownership of people, robots and even ideas.

Jack Chen is a pharmaceutical pirate that reverse engineers drugs to make them available to people in need. She does this by selling hacked in demand pills to fund her more altruistic efforts. Imagine selling off market Viagra to fund malaria relief efforts.

Now imagine Pfizer sending out armed goons with a license to kill to "protect" their intellectual property. In this case it's a military gra ...more

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Apr 17, 2018 Carlex rated it liked it · review of another edition

Three and half stars

A very good cyber/biopunk story, which also deals with transhumanism. Awesome worldbuilding and sense of wonder, and a plot development more than correct. I enjoyed it!

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Oct 29, 2017 Eloise rated it did not like it

1.5 - Oh how do I write this without sounding disrespectful?
It was so interesting and could have been amazing... UNTIL IT GOT HOMOPHOBIC AND TRANSPHOBIC WITHOUT EVEN REALISING IT WAS DOING SO.

Honestly, for the first half of this book, I was really hyped. I was reading about Jack, a female-pharmaceutical-robin-hood and Paladin, a robot who is starting to question autonomy when you're a robot and autonomy when you're human. I couldn't wait for the amazingness that was to come...

Did it come? Well.. ...more

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topics	posts	views	last activity
Fantastična čitao...: Čitaonica #86 - mart 2021: A. Newitz	17	19	Jun 02, 2021 09:54AM
Den of Geek Book ...: Autonomous by Annalee Newitz - Post Your Reviews!	7	53	Sep 18, 2019 09:02PM
Den of Geek Book ...: What are your favorite stories featuring human-equivalent robots?	19	54	Jun 26, 2019 01:48PM
Sci-Fi & Fantasy ...: February 2019 - Autonomous	12	8	Feb 27, 2019 03:32PM
Den of Geek Book ...: Den of Geek Book Club Giveaway!	18	77	Dec 21, 2018 10:41AM

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About Annalee Newitz

Annalee Newitz

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Annalee Newitz is an American journalist who covers the cultural impact of science and technology. They received a PhD in English and American Studies from UC Berkeley, and in 1997 published the widely cited book, White Trash: Race and Class in America. From 2004–2005 they were a policy analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. They write for many periodicals from 'Popular Science' to 'Wired ...more

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“But now we know there has been no one great disaster—only the slow-motion disaster of capitalism converting every living thing and idea into property.” — 30 likes

“For all the robots who question their programming.” — 12 likes

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