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Electric Blue
Hephaestus Forge Biotech crafts the gods of tomorrow. Manufacturing prosthetic limbs and bespoke organs, they're represented by double-leg amputee spokesmodel Cymbre Archer. But a lifetime in the spotlight and wearing company tech has taken its toll on Archer, body and soul, and she's now addicted to painkillers and prone to violent outbursts.
Then her coordinator steals a robot from the company's lab and asks her to hide it. Blindsided when a living, feeling automaton arrives on her doorstep in a crate, Archer finds that Caelan brings with him an unexpected humanity - and the desperate need for a savior.
Archer's no hero, and though she's not the savior Cael needs, it turns out she's the best one he's got.
Then her coordinator steals a robot from the company's lab and asks her to hide it. Blindsided when a living, feeling automaton arrives on her doorstep in a crate, Archer finds that Caelan brings with him an unexpected humanity - and the desperate need for a savior.
Archer's no hero, and though she's not the savior Cael needs, it turns out she's the best one he's got.
366 pages, Paperback
Published August 21, 2023
4 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 29, 2023
Cymbre Archer is a biotech model, double above knee amputee, and an asshole. She’s abrasive, pushes people away and refuses pity. I loved her from the first description of a fashion show for prosthetics. She has deeply ingrained ableism that results in self-hatred and self-sabotage, to the point of loathing the idea of using a wheelchair. Archer’s proud of her independence - she needs no one, until Caelan shows up out of the blue. Archer and Caelan navigate a difficult relationship with each other. Cael is naive to the point of childishness at first, but as he experiences more of the world he’s exposed to, he develops rapidly in both knowledge and empathy, and eh challenges Archer’s thinking:
“He does this. He makes her think about things she's spent her entire life ignoring, he questions things she'd rather just accept or take for granted.”
In turn, Archer develops a sense of responsibility for herself and for Cael, and this gradually deepens into love.
I particularly love the world-building in this book. I could feel and see and hear the ch1 fashion show and the ch2 bar fight! The author’s descriptions of how to evade ubiquitous facial recognition and surveillance cameras are imaginative (and possibly prophetic). There are clear parallels with profit-driven healthcare systems and how horrific conditions can creep up gradually.
My only grouse is that Cael seems designed for perpetual motion. As a physicist, this pulled me out of the story until I got over it!
“He does this. He makes her think about things she's spent her entire life ignoring, he questions things she'd rather just accept or take for granted.”
In turn, Archer develops a sense of responsibility for herself and for Cael, and this gradually deepens into love.
I particularly love the world-building in this book. I could feel and see and hear the ch1 fashion show and the ch2 bar fight! The author’s descriptions of how to evade ubiquitous facial recognition and surveillance cameras are imaginative (and possibly prophetic). There are clear parallels with profit-driven healthcare systems and how horrific conditions can creep up gradually.
My only grouse is that Cael seems designed for perpetual motion. As a physicist, this pulled me out of the story until I got over it!
May 22, 2024
Electric Blue wears its sci-fi lineage on its sleeve. Author Sebastian Jack makes a point of acknowledging the androids and AI that influenced his own creation, the artificial intelligence Cael, on the dedication page at the beginning of the book. Data, HAL, David, Vision, and several other familiar names are on the list. It was a good clue as to what I was in for.
But what I wasn't expecting was just how full of HEART this novel is. Cael is a wonderfully endearing character, and a great many of his lines had me laughing out loud (much to the chagrin of my dog, who wanted me to stop getting distracted while scratching her belly). His love story with protagonist Cymbre Archer is so elegantly written, perfectly paced, and suitably steamy.
Archer's development is also a case study in how to take a character from an unlikeable protagonist to an absolute hero. As a writer, I was taking furious notes.
If you've seen any of a handful of sci-fi pieces, from Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Measure of a Man" (actually referenced in the novel!) to Ridley Scott's Prometheus, you've likely seen much of Electric Blue's body parts. But like Cael himself, Sebastian Jack assembles these individual pieces into something new and wholly beautiful. I'm grateful to have read it.
But what I wasn't expecting was just how full of HEART this novel is. Cael is a wonderfully endearing character, and a great many of his lines had me laughing out loud (much to the chagrin of my dog, who wanted me to stop getting distracted while scratching her belly). His love story with protagonist Cymbre Archer is so elegantly written, perfectly paced, and suitably steamy.
Archer's development is also a case study in how to take a character from an unlikeable protagonist to an absolute hero. As a writer, I was taking furious notes.
If you've seen any of a handful of sci-fi pieces, from Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Measure of a Man" (actually referenced in the novel!) to Ridley Scott's Prometheus, you've likely seen much of Electric Blue's body parts. But like Cael himself, Sebastian Jack assembles these individual pieces into something new and wholly beautiful. I'm grateful to have read it.
January 14, 2024
It's honestly criminal how few people people have discovered this book. It's one of those novels that reminds you of the cultural importance and the transformational power of novels as an art form. In a time where booktok and insta reels fawn over medium and low fantasy smut, Electric Blue delivers a compelling, urgent near future love story. From the opening salvos of sharp dialogue to the gut wrenching conclusion, Electric Blue envelops you. The characters are believable. The setting is fleshed out and the world of not-yet-but-soon high tech climate catastrophic New York is another crucial character. Even the crucial concepts and technological turning points that become key plot crucibles are well researched and based in the quandaries we face today as a tech native society growing up alongside micro computing, capitalized medicine, and artificial intelligence. I can't recommend Electric Blue highly enough. It's truly a book to fall in love with.
July 26, 2023
Sebastian Jack has come straight out of the starting gate with a fantastic debut novel. It’s full of richly developed characters in a near future that’s well-extrapolated from our own, and moves at a rapid pace with ease and humour while keeping its grip on the undercurrent of injustices and dangers it’s addressing. It’s a perfect balance of all these elements.
Electric Blue is compulsive reading; the more you read and get entangled in Archer and Cael’s lives, the more compulsive it gets. Witty, sharp, humane and wonderfully human. Absolute magic.
Electric Blue is compulsive reading; the more you read and get entangled in Archer and Cael’s lives, the more compulsive it gets. Witty, sharp, humane and wonderfully human. Absolute magic.
July 25, 2023
WHERE IS MY SEQUEL??!!??
A very fun read asking some very serious questions about how we see ourselves, and how we see others. Puts a spotlight on questions of sentience and when is a person a 'person'.
Take some time and read this thoughtfully.
A very fun read asking some very serious questions about how we see ourselves, and how we see others. Puts a spotlight on questions of sentience and when is a person a 'person'.
Take some time and read this thoughtfully.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews