For Titus and his friends, it started out like any ordinary trip to the moon – a chance to party during spring break and play with some stupid low-grav at the Ricochet Lounge. But that was before the crazy hacker caused all their feeds to malfunction, sending them to the hospital to lie around with nothing inside their heads for days. And it was before Titus met Violet, a beautiful, brainy teenage girl who has decided to fight the feed and its omnipresent ability to categorize human thoughts and desires.
Following in the footsteps of George Orwell, Anthony Burgess, and Kurt Vonnegut Jr., M. T. Anderson has created a not-so-brave new world — and a smart, savage satire that has captivated readers with its view of an imagined future that veers unnervingly close to the here and now.
Feed by M.T. Anderson is the third book I am reviewing from Molly Horan’s list of 15 Young Adult Books Every Adult Should Read.
Feed started out very promising. Literally the first line grabs you in, “We went to the moon to have fun, but the moon turned out to completely suck.” What an awesome introduction to the book right? So then you start to read it and it takes a bit to get used to the new slang and the fact that it is written using all of the slang from that future. It was not unlike translating a dead language that you have never seen before. But the characters are neat and relatable so you keep reading it to see where the story goes. The author slowly introduces us to this lifestyle and new world and its differences to our world. And it’s a cool concept, very realistic to what could happen. Basically everyone has a chip in their head that connects you to the internet. It’s not a far jump from google glasses to a chip linked to your brain really. At this point you are like 1/3rd of the way through the book and you’re like, “Okay so what’s the plot of this book?”
That’s when the turning point happens (really a very small part of the book) and you think well now the kids are going to live like we live, their chips are deactivated, they have to have normal conversations (GASP!). Up to that point I was loving the book, and concept. But after that point is where I was lost. There were so many good places to go from there that I could not figure out why Anderson went with the path he chose. The book could have been a great warning about becoming too reliant on technology. But instead it was a futuristic cancer story. Only one person was permanently affected, leaving the others to work out their feelings about the affected person.
The one thing I will say is that it was very true to how a teen’s mind works. The slang was very creative and slightly annoying (not unlike some slang now…). I just wish that Anderson would have gone a different way with the plot. I am very disappointed he did not. If it had been more of a warning on relying on technology and the internet too much I would have recommended this book to everyone. As far as Horan’s list of 15 Young Adult Books Every Adult Should Read, I don’t think this book should be on it. Sorry! It is a good read (sad but good).
3.0 Bards
Moving! 