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Catfishing on CatNet
Group Reads Discussions 2020
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"Catfishing on CatNet" Discuss Everything *Spoilers*
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I’ll start!1. The overwhelming strengths were Kritzer’s authentic feel for the way that teens talk to one another, both online and off. It never felt too clever, or pandering, and the easy manner in which they felt for and supported one another was delightful and rang true. Also strong is the direct, unsentimental, and non-pedantic manner in which non-binary and queer characters were included.
2. Its biggest weakness was, for me, its failure to satisfyingly straddle the line of sweetness and darkness. I appreciate that Kritzer works to include very serious issues such as domestic abuse, kidnapping, murder, and stalking, but I’m not sure it all hangs together in the end.
3. See above.
4. I feel like SFFBC is in many ways a clowder!
5. I am glad I spent time with it, and I am happy to read a YA novel that feels like a true representation of contemporary teen life, but it certainly wasn’t earth shattering. A pleasant enough journey that didn’t make me angry, and had many very appealing qualities.
"I am the world's most badass cat picture aficionado" 😻I rated it 5 stars upon finishing, just for an hour or so, because it just made me so f*cking happy! ^_^ It was never going to be a true 5 star read, but I felt like I had to do something to show how happy I was :D
I'm not sure why this had to be YA. The original short story isn't, and that one is a true 5 star story. This could've been as good if it followed several people, some of whom were adults. And of course, more of CC's POV please! But considering how much high school and road trip content there was, I enjoyed it surprisingly much. The world domination plotline didn't really make any sense to me, but it didn't matter, because CC is precious and I love them/her/whatever pronoun CC prefers!
Mod
I agree, I think with a few minor nits the teen (I never said "I'll do this when I am an adult" as a teen. We'd jokingly talk about 'when we were grown ups' but when we were being serious we'd say 'in college' or 'when I'm 18) and online friendships were my favorite parts. I love having friends in my pocket, and honestly these chats felt almost exactly like many of my own personal conversations, minus the PTSD nomad aspect.
Yeah, I'm not sure the stalker aspect made complete sense? I think this should have been toned down a bit and the mom/daughter relationship discussed more. I would never leave my mom alone in the hospital thinking she and I were about to die!! And also I would have been waaaay angrier, even knowing she had a good reason for all the moves. I know people who for various reasons had to move multiple times a year and while they love their parents, there's also a lot of resentment about that upheaval. I don't think I'd be so forgiving, personally.
I have yet to read the short story--I wanted to read it afterwards so I didn't get my expectations messed up.
Anna, you are 100% CC, and I'm probably either Hermione or a naff Firestar ;-) OMG TOO CUTE I CAN'T EVEN!!!!
Yes, I agree the short story was 5 stars for me and I rated this 4 stars.I enjoyed reading it and as I said elsewhere it felt like a Netflix show that I binge watched. Fun, but not particularly deep.
1. What were the strengths of this book?It was fun and sweet. I have an absolute soft spot for non-evil A.I.s. Give me a computer consciousness who just wants to learn and consume pictures of cats, maybe help some people now and then, and I am HOOKED. I have always hated the assumption that artificial intelligence would be evil.
The relationships between the teens felt genuine, and very supportive.
CC being the sex ed bot was EVERYTHING!
2. What were its weaknesses?
Plot was a little weak. The world domination bits were random and didn't make a ton of sense.
The whole drive was also a bit strange. Like, driving long periods can definitely suck. But I feel like it was made to be a much more difficult thing than it was. My husband and I have driven from Massachusetts to Florida and back MANY times. And yeah, it's tiring. But if it were a serious situation like this? Definitely doable without the breakdown Rachel was having about it. For some reason this whole thing irritated me so much.
3. Do you think the darker parts made sense in context of this book?
I like that we had some darkness. But I just think the world domination bit was a bit out of left field. That didn't need to be quite so dramatic. I think the rest worked.
4. Who else wants a clowder?!
I mean, clearly. lol. I have several group chats and SFBCC, and I absolutely rely on them for my sanity. My two best friends each live more than 1,000 miles away from me. (And not even conveniently in the same place.) So virtual relationships are vital.
5. Uh, I mean, what are your overall thoughts? Deserving of the awards it's received?
I enjoyed this. It was sweet, and mostly light. But hit on some heavy topics.
I liked the characters. The stalker plot did its job of creating suspense. It did seem strange that Steph wasn't more worried about her mom in the hospital. I also thought that an AI with human-like emotions and motivations in the near future was unrealistic.
Too fairy-tale, too simplistic... and mostly too familiar. I've read better YA. Fun, but not particularly recommendable. And, yeah, was it dark or light? Was the father a mastermind or an idjit? Were those cops from Wisconsin, or from the author's imagination? (Meaning to say, I'm happy to brag on being WI born & raised but I don't think we have any Matts on our force....)
I would like a clowder of ppl who would actually let me crash in their basement but I don't think SFFBC is quite that supportive. We're too big. We've seen ppl stop posting and afaik have not asked each other if they know what happened to the mia. Still, though, I'm very glad to have you all for what we can do for one another.
Mod
But I do agree, it might be a bit much of me to ask to crash at your place, Cheryl haha! It is my ardent hope that some people form friendships here that transcend GR.
I'm not sure if Matt is meant to symbolize any particular WI cop, but more an aggregate of the "hoods to badges" initiative that several white supremacist groups have sponsored over the past 50 years.
(Well, let it be known here that I do have a spare room and a camp cot, so if I know any of you close to as well as the kids in the book know each other, you've got a free night avl. :)
I feel inadequate as a cat fan, because I don't think I knew the word clowder before this book! Now it's one of my favorite words. Clowder.I loved how Kritzer captured the dynamic of being friends online, and the particular dynamic of being teenagers being friends online. I also loved how supportive the whole clowder could be. I really enjoyed the hacking of the sex ed bot--extremely teenage, the entirety of it, and Chesire Cat's role was so wonderfully earnest.
I really enjoyed CC and the Clowder, but I also felt that the plot elements didn't totally mesh together. However, this is the first book I've managed to finish in almost 3 weeks, which I think says something about how entertaining and easy to read it was. Kristin, I also had questions about Rachel's reaction to the drive. I think driving for so long would be harder and more stressful as a teenager, without the familiarity with driving, but honestly I think letting someone who had NEVER DRIVEN BEFORE drive would be more stressful, especially on the freeway.
Perhaps we should use Vonnegut's terms from Cat's Cradle: granfalloon and karass. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granfal...It seems that Steph's clowder became (or showed itself to be) a karass. ChesireCat deserves a lot of credit for understanding what humans want and need better than many humans.
I'd say that SFFBC is a granfalloon. Some subgroup in it might certainly be a karass, but I really can't see the whole 20,000+ group that anyone can join as anything more than a superficial grouping, however fun it may be.
I wouldn't call this book fantasy or science fiction. If anything perhaps speculative fiction, but that's the voice of a reader who's not nearly as skilled as publishers at categorizing a book.I dreamt of staying in a yurt not long after finishing this one.
I typically avoid YA and any weaknesses I detected in the story I figured were probably ok and passable for a YA audience. The robots from the coffee shop coming to the brownstone to take down Michael? That was pretty painful. Turning a road trip into an agonizing feat of survival? Ok maybe teens think it's really that hard to drive.
What I enjoyed *most* about the book was the changes in voice and especially the Clowder chapters. CC wasn't convincing as the speaker; I mean I'd think an AI would think and narrate differently. But the clowders were a great technique of introducing story points and moving things on in a nontraditional way.
Of course it is science fiction. How can AI not be science fiction?
The AI was such a small part of the story, really. Most of the drama and the characters could have happened without CC being sapient.
Deborah wrote: "Of course it is science fiction. How can AI not be science fiction?"I felt the AI and prime-based cryptography exploitation (both of which are already realities to a degree) were minor backdrops to the more prominent story which was Steph's journey of self-discovery.
In the same way that I don't consider traveling to the moon SF, but I do consider sending humans to Mars SF, I guess I'm just splitting hairs here.
Even though CC was an equal-part speaker in the narrative I felt the story was not about CC or the birth of AI.
I was hoping for a while there that CC was an AI made by Steph's mom or her dad (or even the mysterious Sochi) to find a way to meaninfully connect with her world and keep her safe.
That would have been cool if Mom made CC.
Hey everyone, I'm new here (to any group on Goodreads actually) so it's unfortunate that my first contribution to this group is pretty negative. No hate towards those who liked this book at all, it just didn't resonate with me.1. What were the strengths of this book?
All of CC's chapters, and anything and everything to do with CC (the sex ed robot, the drone vs the English teacher, the final confrontation) was fun, cute and entertaining.
The mother character was very intriguing, it's a shame she was just in the hospital for most of the book.
The Clowder chat format was a cool storytelling gimmick.
2. What were its weaknesses?
Pretty much everything else.
One dimensional boring characters (except for maybe Rachel who was at least interesting), diversity just for the sake of diversity, every member of the Clowder was purely defined by their gender identity, literally, nothing else about them was interesting in the least.
The plot was silly and made no sense.
The main character was pretty forgettable and had no real arc.
Read my full review for detailed thoughts.
3. Do you think the darker parts made sense in context of this book?
The mother dealing with trauma and being 'paranoid', staring into space for days, was one of the only interesting things about this book, so I definitely wish it was explored further.
The stuff with the psychopath father was dumb and he had no meaningful motivation other than a ludicrous plot to rule the world.
4. Who else wants a clowder?!
Yes please.
5. Uh, I mean, what are your overall thoughts? Deserving of the awards it's received?
Definitely wouldn't say it deserves any awards. It was a pointless read, the only enjoyable parts all had to do with CC.
Mod
Thanks Allison! Yeah, I just voted in the polls now, very cool picks! I'm excited for whatever ends up winning!
Hey, welcome to you, blackember! I'm off to check out your reviews, as you said what I was thinking about this book much better than I could articulate it!
Thanks Cheryl! Your compliment gave me a nice ego boost... for a few seconds, until I checked out your profile and saw your reading goal and your progress so far! That put me back in my place.
Anyway I appreciate the warm welcome, I regret not having joined sooner!
I liked Catfishing on CatNet enough to stay up too late last night finishing it. It's been a while since I've done that. As others have mentioned the teens felt authentic although these were usually nicer and more together than what I remember. Some of the stories sounded very familiar. I was especially taken with the one about the year of the plaid and the sexbot hacking sounds like an expansion of something that I might have heard about (mumble) in high school. All of this growing up in small town upper midwest felt right on too. I spent time in those towns - including one mentioned by name. I also used to work in Cambridge and I can picture where that final confrontation was set. For me those were good bookends to hang the rest of the story on.There were some things that I found a bit jarring. The AI seemed too good for a first effort - especially running on laptop-class hardware - and felt too human. The adults were pretty flat (especially the father), but then the book wasn’t about them. Having Steph's father motivated by an integer factorization algorithm as a quest for power seemed kind of out there for a YA but I had to laugh at her description of the Wikipedia page on the problem. Very accurate.
Overall I loved the flow of the book and the way the characters found their way through to the finish together. I'm looking forward to the next book in the series.
I absolutely loved this book and had several moments where I just burst out laughing. It was just a warm and happy book with a really interesting mystery. The father was a bit two dimensional and a bit too evil to seem like a real person (seriously, drawing a gun on his daughter to get her in the car? he was a bit free with that gun in general) but I enjoyed the story anyway.Did they ever figure out how he got to her town or why his phone had been left behind? Or did he just do something with tracking apps?
He stole a car, so the AI didn't recognize him associated with that car.
But his phone was still in California, wasn't it?
I don't remember, but if so, yeah, again, that means the AI assumes he's in CA and doesn't have any other way to trace him. I mean, ok, the AI could have seen that the phone didn't move *at all* and been suspicious, but they seem rather naive (unsurprisingly).Maybe my logic is confused. I don't have a smart phone or smart car or Siri or anything, and I've turned off location service on my wifi tablet, so maybe I don't know how tracking works or missed something unfamiliar to me.
Mod
Anna wrote: ""I am the world's most badass cat picture aficionado" 😻I rated it 5 stars upon finishing, just for an hour or so, because it just made me so f*cking happy! ^_^ It was never going to be a true 5 s..."
LOL, me too, what a fun story! :-D
Haha, yay! Partners in glee rating crime! :D
@blackember: I agree with you completely both in regards to the strengths and weaknesses.I read the short story the novel was based on and it was wonderful. But then AI was marginalised in the novel, somehow faded into the background. CheshireCat chapters and sex ed bot subplot were the only parts that I actually enjoyed.
All the rest felt shallow to me. Some really important and relevant subjects were there (family problems, abuse, mental health, queer identity and a few others), but I felt like the author just grazed the surface without making these things come alive.
I ended up just being bored. Maybe I'm too old for this book 😕
Reading through the comments here, I think it's great to have such a diverse group with so many opinions. I "glee rated" it 5 as well, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to leave it because: 1. I enjoyed it more than I enjoyed plenty of 4-star and even 5-star reads and 2. Reviews are so skewed because of this scale where many readers see 3 stars and assume it's terrible (though 3 should be average) /rant. Anyway, I kind of adored this book. Yeah, it's got flaws, and as I read comments I notice some of them more, but I just fell in love with it. I think part of it is my own growing up in a small town and how absolutely spot-on the whole middle portion of the book felt for me. Like, it really felt quite a bit like my high school interactions growing up, and though those aren't necessarily things I enjoyed every time, they certainly hold a weird and apparently mostly untapped feel of nostalgia in some ways.
The book also made me think quite a bit about online security for kids as they get older and how I personally narrowly avoided a lot of the trouble that people can get into and in some ways did in this novel.
Loved CC and the AI as well. I just thought it was great all around and I feel warm and fuzzy about it.
Truly, the only thing that I didn't like was the epilogue with the pseudo-cliffhanger ending. I could have done with this as a standalone and been totally happy. But I'll definitely be checking out the next book.
J.W. wrote: "Reading through the comments here, I think it's great to have such a diverse group with so many opinions. I "glee rated" it 5 as well, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to leave it because: 1. I enjoye..."I agree about the review scale being problematic.
I used to rate books much more highly until only a few months ago when I realized what the Goodreads review scale was (by hovering over the stars).
A 2-star rating seems very low but it translates to 'it was ok', which most people would rate a 7/10. And the only possible rating for not liking a book is a 1-star rating, there's no nuance or degree to which you can dislike a book, not liking it and hating it are one and the same on Goodreads.
It's kinda weird, I'm still getting used to it.
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Melanie, the neutral party
(last edited May 22, 2020 12:41PM)
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rated it 4 stars
Mod
I concur that the book portrays teen authentically, and it is pleasing to read it. My favorite scene is when they hack the robot to give accurate answers to teenagers' questions about sex-ex!
I am full of meh. I suspect I would have enjoyed this more if I were in the targeted demographic, but I'm not and so the technical issues bothered me more. Events happened because the plot needed them to, not because they made sense for the characters to do. People hashed out serious problems in a conversation and then it was all fine. And I'm sorry but the password being something that Steph would think about her birthday is just too convenient for me. It was cute, but I can't give it more then two stars.
Two months later:I just finished reading this-- and then I find out it's also a SFF book! Yay! (I always mean to read these books, but never get around to it, when the discussion is happening.)
So. I read Cat Pictures Please and Other Stories, soon after my state went into lockdown. I started with the story in there "So Much Cooking," which may still be on Tor's site. I can't recommend that story highly enough. Then I got the book for a just a little money from Kindle. When I rated it highly, Kindle wanted me to read & offered Catfishing on CatNet for a small price...
I haven't reviewed it yet, but I will soon & I'll probably give it 5 stars, because I needed to read a book like this after/ while/ before also reading How to Be an Antiracist, Light It Up and Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You. I do read a fair amount of YA, but the earnest voices, true to life voices and diverse voices were unusual here.
So mostly well- adjusted yet sekritive teens: YAY! A group of cyber friends, when probably most of them don't have RL friends: YAY! I liked it that they were so nice to teach other. As someone who lives rurally now, I totally got best friend Rachel needing a driving buddy and wanting to drive nowhere near Chicago. I loved that it was a teen who ratted CC out as a sex ed teacher. I loved lonely CC who wanted the people on Catnet to be happy, and put them in groups to make that happen.
Sarah, way up there, you asked how did EVILDad get to teeny town Wisconsin. That one I remember: he borrowed a friend's jet & pilot, or that's what their friend who also lives in Silicon Valley's parents might have done.
Here's one i didn't see: how did EVILDad charm every cop, hospital administrator, current wife, school administrator when he such a snake?
Thanks for discussing this!
Anna wrote: ""I am the world's most badass cat picture aficionado" 😻I rated it 5 stars upon finishing, just for an hour or so, because it just made me so f*cking happy! ^_^ It was never going to be a true 5 s..."
I really loved this book. I thought I wouldn't like it when I picked it up but it was really well done and should be a nice entry point for people hesistant to read Sci-Fi.
I still remember this book very fondly! ^_^(I didn't love the sequel, but I'll read anything in this world in the future.)
Now I feel strangely obligated to read Chaos on CatNet. Lol.
(Reasons for not loving Chaos: Too little CC/clowder, too much religious cult.)
That was not the response I expected. Intriguing. . . My companion readers were all great fans of CC. I'm not as trusting as they are. Thanks for the heads up!
I stayed up way too late last night to finish this book. I really enjoyed the friendships, CheshireCat, and reading about teens that felt real (and a YA novel without a romance subplot - the budding maybe relationship between Steph and Rachel at the end felt just right). The parts with the dad were a little too real for me, especially up to and including the scene where we meet him, so the middle part of the book was stressful reading, and I needed to know the ending would be okay. I was actually glad that the last third was less believable, even though it was also a little disappointing. I still found all the robots coming to save them very satisfying, though. I wish we had gotten a little more of the mom / daughter relationship, especially at the end, but it was also okay that it mostly focused on Steph.
I’ve never read the short story that this world was based on, so I’m definitely going to check that out now. I may put the sequel in my to-read queue for a later time.
SciFi and Fantasy Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
Cat Pictures Please and Other Stories (other topics)Catfishing on CatNet (other topics)
How to Be an Antiracist (other topics)
Light It Up (other topics)
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You (other topics)
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1. What were the strengths of this book?
2. What were its weaknesses?
3. Do you think the darker parts made sense in context of this book?
4. Who else wants a clowder?!
5. Uh, I mean, what are your overall thoughts? Deserving of the awards it's received?