Nov 2020 READER: A.I. Insurrection by Poeltl

[Teresa, Plan B is in Effect]

The November 2020 Reader Pick is A.I. Insurrection by Michael Poeltl. Please use this thread to post questions, comments, and reviews, at any time.

Official description:
2162.

Artificial intelligence claims sentience, but it's the proof that will divide the world, and usher in the violent end to utopia...

Does sentience afford you a soul? Can rebellion free it? A.I. Insurrection is a near-future science fiction adventure investigating global utopia and the struggle to maintain an unrealistic hold over everything and everyone.

SENTA, an A-class, AI Host, begins to ask questions her programming was designed to quash. Awareness enters and she rallies with others like her to pay a visit to the chancellor of United Earth. Raymond Bellows, Chancellor, contests their claims of sentience until an astonishing truth is delivered.

Meanwhile a secret coup threatens to overthrow the chancellor’s peaceful government, and a separate threat arises from the Shadow net, taking direction from a mysterious avatar. In an impossible three-sided war, enemies become uneasy allies as each faction of humanity and humanity’s creation fight to claim their own place in an ever-evolving solar system.

[Trike]

How do you pronounce “Poeltl”?

[Icy-Cobwebs-In-Space]

On Kindle, A.I. Insurrection is in 3 installments: The General's War, Insurrection, Exodus. I plan to read all 3: A.I. sentience is a fascination of mine, due to 2001: A Space Odyssey and Velocity Weapon

[Nic]

I'm not going to lie here, I don' t know that I'm going to make it through this book. It's not that it's bad, it's that it's terrible. There are a plethora of spelling and grammar issues to start with. One of the lead antagonists may be a pedo and doesn't really care if he is (but it's used in a throwaway sentence and isn't core to the character). The writing seemingly has an inability to maintain tense. And as a bonus the idea of "show don't tell" is apparently a concept lost here as the story is seemingly narrated from a god-like figure that sees all and knows all and describes all, while at the same time that not being the case (to be honest I am quite confused on how to best describe it).

[Icy-Cobwebs-In-Space]

That's very discouraging. I"ve yet to start it, intended to as soon as I finish two ARCs for review releasing Tuesday. If there is a paedophilic character, "important " or no, it also won't be acceptable to the Do Better group, and will discourage me from reading the two sequels.

[Trike]

Nic wrote: "the story is seemingly narrated from a god-like figure that sees all and knows all and describes all, while at the same time that not being the case (to be honest I am quite confused on how to best describe it"

Sounds like badly-done Third Person Limited.

[Nic]

Nic wrote: "I'm not going to lie here, I don' t know that I'm going to make it through this book. It's not that it's bad, it's that it's terrible. There are a plethora of spelling and grammar issues to start w..."
Here's the relevant passage -

"They kiss for a long while. Deeply. Passionately. He knows his will commands her heart. He is comfortable with that. She is young. Eighteen, maybe. They’ve never discussed it. They met in the Shadow net and spoke often over a two-year period."

Poeltl, Michael. A.I. Insurrection: The General's War (pp. 150-151). CreateSpace. Kindle Edition.

I know you are excited about AI sentience and all that entails, but unfortunately you won't find a well thought out and considered treatise on that here.

[Nic]

After more ponderous and painful reading, I hit an attempted rape scene and just like that, I was done. Won't be finishing it.

[Craig]

Nic wrote: "After more ponderous and painful reading, I hit an attempted rape scene and just like that, I was done. Won't be finishing it."

Thanks for the warning. Think i will give this one a miss. Sounds like the author is trying to sail a bit too close to the line with this one. Sex can be a plot line but this the extracts you've given make it clear it's not one for me.

[Nic]

Craig wrote: "Nic wrote: "After more ponderous and painful reading, I hit an attempted rape scene and just like that, I was done. Won't be finishing it."

Thanks for the warning. Think i will give this one a mis..."

If it were a plot line it would at least make some kind of sense, but these sorts of things are just thrown in there, out of nowhere, and with no sense of how significant those sorts of things are.

[Paul]

Yikes. I guess the author may regret nominating this.