Book club members advice needed - Robot VS Android

[Dennis]

Robot VS Android
We just got some feedback from our beta readers, as usual, it was constructive and insightful. Thanks beta readers.

I have two questions and I’m hoping for some comments from the Goodreads book club members.

The book is futuristic, there are humanlike house helpers and then there are the “mechs” who definitely don’t look human, they can be spiderlike or snakelike, etc. A beta read thinks we should call them all androids, we are calling them all robots.

1 – Would it be confusing to you, the reader if we called some robots (the mechs) and some androids (the humanlike)?

2 – Is the term android as popular/recognizable a term as robot for the general reader?

The book is the Neuromorphs [http://dennismeredith.com/the-neuromo...] and please note I do not add the link for promotion, just if you need/want more information.

Regards,

Joni
Joanne Meredith
editor@glyphus.com

[Chris]

As a reader, I see more of AI, mechs and android. Robot is used rarely, and when it is, it refers to non-humanoid-form artificial life, as are "drone" and "droid." Of course, don't take this as a rule, as they're all used interchangeable. It depends on the author. I haven't come across any rules. Personally, I like to use something less common, like automaton/AI for humanoid robots. For everything else, anything apart from android is acceptable.

[Dennis]

Chris,

Thanks so much for your comment.

We will probably edit the manuscript as the story involved three types of "creatures"

-- Humanlike ones that we can call "androids"

-- Human-shaped, plastic-clad Helpers that we can call "mechs."

--Then, there are spiderlike military Defenders. They should be called "robots".

[Chris]

Sounds like a plan. Best of luck