His Robot Wife

by Wesley Allison

Five years ago, Mike Smith was an unhappy man living all alone. Then he purchased a Daffodil. Far more than regular robots, his Daffodil Patience, changed his life in ways that he had never thought possible. Now it is the year 2037, and Mike and Patience have been married for five years. Retired and enjoying life, Mike thought that all his troubles were behind him, but it seems as though they are creeping up again. California Proposition 22 proposes to define a person as a biological entity, thereby annulling marriages, like Mike’s and Patience’s, performed in other states. Battle lines have been drawn, at least as far as the proponents of the bill are concerned. Now Mike must muster his own support to defeat the measure. But there is more going on than just politics. Daffodil, the robot maker, is in the news again. Hardware issues are leaving robots across the globe unable to function. Is it only an antenna issue? Now Patience herself is behaving oddly. Is there something really wrong with her, or does she just need a software upgrade?

Genres: Fiction, Science Fiction, Robots

115 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 1, 2011

About the author

Wesley Allison is the author of more than thirty science fiction and fantasy books, including the popular His Robot Girlfriend. He has a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and a Master of Science degree from Nova Southeastern University in Florida. He has taught English and American History for the past 25 years in Southern Nevada where he lives with his lovely wife Victoria, his two grown children Rebecca and John.

For more information about the author and upcoming books:
Visit the City of Amathar Blog at http://wesleyallison.com
Visit the Author Wesley Allison page on Facebook.

If you would like to become a patron and supporter of this author and his works,
and receive insider information and free ebooks:
Visit the Patreon Page at http://www.patreon.com/wesleyallison

Books by Wesley Allison:

Published Books

1. Princess of Amathar (2007)

2. His Robot Girlfriend (2008)

3. Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Elven Princess (2009)

4. Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Sorceress (2009)

5. Brechalon (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 0) (2010)

6. The Voyage of the Minotaur (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 1) (2010)

7. Tesla’s Stepdaughters (2010)

8. The Dark and Forbidding Land (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 2) (2010)

9. The Drache Girl (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 3) (2010)

10. His Robot Wife (2011)

11. Women of Power (2011)

12. Blood Trade (2011)

13. Astrid Maxxim and her Amazing Hoverbike (2011)

14. The Young Sorceress (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 4) (2012)

15. The Two Dragons (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 5) (2012)

16. The Many Adventures of Eaglethorpe Buxton (2012)

17. Astrid Maxxim and her Undersea Dome (2013)

18. His Robot Wife: Patience is a Virtue (2013)

19. The Sorceress and her Lovers (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 6) (2014)

20. Desperate Poems (2014)

21. Astrid Maxxim and the Antarctic Expedition (2014)

22. Astrid Maxxim and her Hypersonic Space Plane (2014)

23. His Robot Girlfriend: Charity (2015)

24. The Price of Magic (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 7) (2015)

25. Astrid Maxxim and the Electric Racecar Challenge

26. A Plague of Wizards (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 8)

27. Kanana: The Jungle Girl

28. His Robot Wife: A Great Deal of Patience

29. The Dragon's Choice (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 9)

30. Astrid Maxxim and the Mystery of Dolphin Island

31. Nova Dancer

Reviews

[Alec's Always Bored · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pleasant surprise

The first book in the series was fair. I read it last year as a free ebook. Cute but kinda flat but with potential for deeper themes of what it means to be human. This second book is a major improvement. More of the world and the questions sounding what it means to be human is explored. Even Mike seems unsure if his fantasy girl is really real or it’s just his emotional attachment. These books are fun.

[Jason Brown (Toastx2) · Rating 3 out of 5]

His Robot Wife, disappointing…

His Robot Wife had the capability of being a decent story. It has some good components and given some external editing and feedback, it seems like it could have really gone someplace. Instead, readers are left with a barely evolved rendition of the first book.

I held off on a review of this for a month, thinking my thoughts were a bit harsh. After a month, I still felt the same way, so my apologies to the author, but here is my unfiltered perspective.

–

Last year, I read the first novella in this series, His Robot Girlfriend. It was enjoyable and didn’t take much effort to go through. In fact, I enjoyed it enough that barring some inconsistencies and a far too gentle plot arc, I recommended it to other readers. I STILL recommend it to readers.

In ‘Girlfriend’, there is some foreshadowing that leads you to think major shit-storms are on their way. After a very disappointing 2-3 page climax, you are left with a book that primarily describes what food the robot makes for its owner, and how much time it spends changing clothes and buying new clothes. This is not inherently bad. I love a good character sketch, and if it is read with this type of perspective it was pretty damn decent. Not for a full novel, but as a novella, this is just right.

The sequel, ‘His Robot Wife’ gets the exact opposite suggestion. Do not waste your time on this novella.
Unfortunately, where the initial novella gets slack for being an interesting premise, the second fails out right.

What is confusing here is that complaints against the first book were common and consistent, with readers stating they enjoyed the story but felt that the plot was missing “PUNCH” or ended on a low note. Why Mr. Allison would not take this into account before publishing the sequel, I can’t say. It needed to go someplace, instead, we got another 2-3 pages of build up, and then the main character was escorted to his car in a parking lot and I scratched my head thinking “That’s it? Where the heck is the rest of it?”…

We were not interested in another Character sketch, it needed a climax. I don’t mind if it is short and sweet, quickies are nice provided everyone is left satisfied. I want to be kept engaged. When you blow your metaphoric load, I want my share of enjoyment out of it, not just the knowledge that someone mounted me, wiggled around for two minutes, and now need some tissues for my lower back.

This book proves one of the negative aspects to the self publishing industry. There are not enough people involved in making sure the author is releasing the book at the right time with the right amount of editing, changes, and enhancements. This book could have gone a lot further if someone had simply said, “Hey Wesley, nothing happened in this story.. what’s up with that?”. The author could then reevaluate if chapters 5-6 needed to be revamped, if it would be better leave a cliff hanger, etc. Instead, this feels like a released 2nd draft, where the book is only in skeletal form.

My thoughts: Keep writing Mr. Allison, but perhaps invest some time in finding outside feedback before going to market.

For scope, I actually follow Allison’s blog. I find him to be an interesting fellow and I enjoy his work. Unfortunately, this makes the flop that much more impacting.

Toastx2

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short, with a curiously abrupt ending, but a pleasant read nonetheless....

[Jenni Mac · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was highly underwhelmed by this novella. I really enjoyed the first novella, but this one just fell flat in many places. The monotony of Mike and Patience's days was grueling. I didn't need to know everything he was eating. When things got somewhat interesting, the book ended! I don't know that I'll be reading the next books in the series.

[Emanuele · Rating 2 out of 5]

Short and sweet, nice follow up to the original concept novel. The idea is interesting and it should have been developed better: as things stand this is basically a matter of ‘something is strange... oh, thats what it was’.

I cannot stop thinking that this idea could have led to a really interesting series in the hands of a more gifted writer

[J. J. Hynd · Rating 5 out of 5]

His Robot Wife (and the original book) were odd and yet absolutely delightful reads. It went from odd to me finding it charming. I thoroughly enjoyed both books and now I've remembered them I want to give them a reread and see how i feel quite some years later.

[Erik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Girlfriend turned wife and the story continues to unfold. A good read.

[J. B. Pichelski · Rating 2 out of 5]

After being a little bit disappointed by the first book, I thought that perhaps Wesley would have learned from his mistakes (i.e: writing a book where very little actually happens.) and at first I thought that he had as. This book seemed to have a real obstacle that the main character will be trying to defeat throughout the book, in fact, it even introduced a 'B plot' that also involves the main character tackling a completely different problem.

My heart sank when I found out that, once again, Wesley prefers to focus most of the story on how perfect is robot wife is and how she cooks, cleans, wears a whole wardrobe of clothes for him and then has sex with him on a daily basis. In between these long, drawn out and extensively described scenes; Wesley does manage to slip in a few paragraphs every now and then to try and nudge the story along, but even then most of the time dedicated to the plot is predictable and not much happens. In fact, I think near the end, Wesley realised that the plot was going nowhere and just wrapped it all up in a neat little package for us. No real climax, no 'final battle'; nothing interesting whatsoever.

The first book was more or less the same as this, in fact it's almost exactly the same, I felt like I had read the same book twice. The real problem with this book is that Wesley got a lot of criticism after 'His Robot Girlfriend' was published because it was too boring and very little happened; so why didn't he listen? Did he honestly think we wanted more endless descriptions of clothes? This book had potential, but it's so sad to see that this is the end result.

And the humour isn't that funny either.

[Filip · Rating 1 out of 5]

It breaks my heart to give such a low rating to an independent book, but I won't go into a "boo-hoo, my time and money has been spent" rant. You might like it as there are 5 star reviews too, and at one dollar, any book is a bargain.

Here we go again, and yes, I will still read the sequel to this book once it gets out because I still have faith in this story not being destined to be a mess.

Some people, me included, were bothered that there is not much going on in the first book. The sequel is even less eventful. Basically, the worst thing that could happen is the fact that their marriage might not be valid. And with five years gone by, you would expect that there are a lot more human-robot marriages. Wrong. Once you find out that there are seven in the whole state, you put on your best confused face and wonder how could anyone bother to join Mike's cause, let alone oppose this arrangement.

Again, exploring the depth of human and robot relationship on any given scale? Zero points given.

The conclusion of the book is uncathartic as anything in the series and takes a whole Smashwords page. Boom, done.

And what's up with diet Pepsi again?

[Luciano · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is somewhat better than Allison's first one. It isn't going to win the Pulitzer for literature, but it's a fun read. I honestly like the way Allison writes. When he's in the zone the dialogue between the characters can be quite witty and entertaining. The problem is that it's really kind of hard to understand where the story is going. There really is not a lot going on to propel it forward. Things happen, but it almost seems that situations are created just to keep the main characters busy doing something. But they don't serve as any really understandable plot devices. The closest metaphor I can think of is that this story is kind of like a Seinfeld episode, a whole lot ado about nothing.

[Shaun S · Rating 3 out of 5]

Continuation of the saga of Patience Smith. That's right, they are now married! What antics will the Smiths get into as they are married? Again, no real other plot points than the navigation of the day for these two. I couldnt even tell you where the climax is.

[Kendra Nielson · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can tell why this book was on the free list.

[Thidwick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short in length, and a bit short on plot. The story rests on the premise that the reader will be interested in the idea of having a life-like, understanding and sexy robot as a wife.

[Juan Bautista]

I enjoyed the previous book and would like to know how this love story between different sentients ends.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyed this book... That's about it really. Nothing outstanding but a good read.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm enjoying the series. I'm I the only one that sees a resemblance between the series and some parts of the AMC series "Humans"?