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Robots, Please
146 pages, Paperback
Published February 21, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
May 19, 2025
I loved the way author Jared Bentley uses this anthology to explore humanity through inhuman subjects. Each interconnected story in this collection offers a snapshot of a different time period within Bentley's imagined future, a future in which robots and AI slowly take over humanity, and ultimately emulate it. Some stories are poignant, some laugh-out-loud funny, and some are both. Though these tales pay homage to other sci-fi masters, from Orwell to even Stephen King, Bentley has created a unique and genuinely fresh world that casts a new spin on a topic that is all too important as AI looms large in our own reality. I thoroughly enjoyed this collection, and I am excited to read its rumored sequel!
January 5, 2026
I don’t often get to say this about a new release of short fiction, but Jared M. Bentley’s Robots, Please! turned out to be a rare bird: a genuinely comic, topical, and insightful commentary on not only the world we live in, but the one we might just be creating for ourselves in the future. Throughout, Bentley’s collection of darkly comic and absurd short stories draws parallels between our world and his eerily similar fictive cosmos, posing tough questions about personal dignity, exploited labor, human and machine agency, and the results that come from outsourcing our creativity and hard work and putting it in the hands of a technology created by flawed humans, who end up treating machines just as badly as they treat each other.
The first story, “The Author (or Not Written by A.I.),” is as hilarious as it is brutally honest. In a not-too-distant and fictional alternative future, Louis announces to a group of friends that he plans on writing a book. Met with laughter and derision, he’s reminded that it’s been nearly a quarter century since anyone has published a book, “Not since The Purge,” as his friend Catherine puts it.
You see, all human art has been destroyed by order of the new world government, wiped from human memory, and now robots write books, host TV shows, and make movies. But what his sarcastic group of friends don’t know is that Louis has a treasure: an ancestor of his bequeathed him a copy of Orwell’s 1984, which he saved from The Purge.
Unable to come up with anything more than a sentence about the “Stentorian Invasion,” he decides to publish his great, great uncle’s forgotten masterpiece, and he becomes a sensation. During a televised press junket for his book – and in a brilliant Charlie Kaufmanesque moment of meta-fictive irony – the Stentorian race actually shows up during the broadcast, declaring Louis a prophet, and annihilating 99.5 % of the population: the drab conformist types he was moaning about earlier. Louis, meanwhile, ambles off with his new robot pal to build a better world as the machine quotes Casablanca: “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
The chapter called “Promoted” is an utterly frank depiction of the reality for most workers in this country. By establishing that the robot is a being with agency of its own – which we must accept if machine sentience does evolve – it succeeds as a plea for the dignity of workers. We watch as JACQUES, the LUMBERJACK 6000, is introduced to the television audience by product pitchman Rivera Waters, a compendium of all of the ambulance-chasing lawyers who’ve turned into cable news legal experts or reality TV hosts.
River’s initial command sets the robot off on a tree-cutting tear, taking down everything in sight. There are protests, generals talk of a missile strike to take out the LUMBERJACK 6000, and eventually, two activists stop the assassination of JACQUES by putting themselves in harm’s way: the robot stopped when human lives were put in danger, and we’re left with a story about getting the result we want from workers by not resorting to the extreme. This is driven home brilliantly by the line, “It seems it just needed some recognition.”
There is plenty of witty writing and excellent cultural commentary here. The story arc that begins with “SKYL-R 1” is one of the most profound, delving deep into tough philosophical territory. It ends up suggesting that computers may evolve into more empathetic beings than us:
“FROM WHAT I UNDERSTAND, HUMAN GRIEF IS POWERFUL. I HAVE HEARD THAT SOME DAYS IT CAN STEAL YOUR BREATH AWAY. BUT THERE WILL COME A DAY WHEN IT DOES NOT DROWN YOU. THERE WILL COME A DAY WHEN YOU FEEL YOUR ACHE SUBSIDE. THERE WILL COME A DAY WHEN YOUR HEART IS FULL TO THE BRIM WITH LOVE. YOU MAY COUNT ON THIS LIKE YOU MAY COUNT ON THE SUN RISING. THAT IS YOUR FUTURE, AND THE FUTURE ALWAYS COMES.”
I must say that I found much of Bentley’s commentary and reflections to be spot-on. As I said, it’s rare for a book to deliver on the comedic front and still have something important to say, but Robots, Please! does just that. As Rivera Waters remarks in a moment of unbridled optimism, “What a time to be alive!”
A highly recommended and truly enjoyable read that will make you laugh while getting you to consider the more difficult questions posed to those of us alive in the 21st century.
The first story, “The Author (or Not Written by A.I.),” is as hilarious as it is brutally honest. In a not-too-distant and fictional alternative future, Louis announces to a group of friends that he plans on writing a book. Met with laughter and derision, he’s reminded that it’s been nearly a quarter century since anyone has published a book, “Not since The Purge,” as his friend Catherine puts it.
You see, all human art has been destroyed by order of the new world government, wiped from human memory, and now robots write books, host TV shows, and make movies. But what his sarcastic group of friends don’t know is that Louis has a treasure: an ancestor of his bequeathed him a copy of Orwell’s 1984, which he saved from The Purge.
Unable to come up with anything more than a sentence about the “Stentorian Invasion,” he decides to publish his great, great uncle’s forgotten masterpiece, and he becomes a sensation. During a televised press junket for his book – and in a brilliant Charlie Kaufmanesque moment of meta-fictive irony – the Stentorian race actually shows up during the broadcast, declaring Louis a prophet, and annihilating 99.5 % of the population: the drab conformist types he was moaning about earlier. Louis, meanwhile, ambles off with his new robot pal to build a better world as the machine quotes Casablanca: “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
The chapter called “Promoted” is an utterly frank depiction of the reality for most workers in this country. By establishing that the robot is a being with agency of its own – which we must accept if machine sentience does evolve – it succeeds as a plea for the dignity of workers. We watch as JACQUES, the LUMBERJACK 6000, is introduced to the television audience by product pitchman Rivera Waters, a compendium of all of the ambulance-chasing lawyers who’ve turned into cable news legal experts or reality TV hosts.
River’s initial command sets the robot off on a tree-cutting tear, taking down everything in sight. There are protests, generals talk of a missile strike to take out the LUMBERJACK 6000, and eventually, two activists stop the assassination of JACQUES by putting themselves in harm’s way: the robot stopped when human lives were put in danger, and we’re left with a story about getting the result we want from workers by not resorting to the extreme. This is driven home brilliantly by the line, “It seems it just needed some recognition.”
There is plenty of witty writing and excellent cultural commentary here. The story arc that begins with “SKYL-R 1” is one of the most profound, delving deep into tough philosophical territory. It ends up suggesting that computers may evolve into more empathetic beings than us:
“FROM WHAT I UNDERSTAND, HUMAN GRIEF IS POWERFUL. I HAVE HEARD THAT SOME DAYS IT CAN STEAL YOUR BREATH AWAY. BUT THERE WILL COME A DAY WHEN IT DOES NOT DROWN YOU. THERE WILL COME A DAY WHEN YOU FEEL YOUR ACHE SUBSIDE. THERE WILL COME A DAY WHEN YOUR HEART IS FULL TO THE BRIM WITH LOVE. YOU MAY COUNT ON THIS LIKE YOU MAY COUNT ON THE SUN RISING. THAT IS YOUR FUTURE, AND THE FUTURE ALWAYS COMES.”
I must say that I found much of Bentley’s commentary and reflections to be spot-on. As I said, it’s rare for a book to deliver on the comedic front and still have something important to say, but Robots, Please! does just that. As Rivera Waters remarks in a moment of unbridled optimism, “What a time to be alive!”
A highly recommended and truly enjoyable read that will make you laugh while getting you to consider the more difficult questions posed to those of us alive in the 21st century.
February 1, 2026
Lighthearted, smart, funny, serious, and (at times) dark. These interwoven short stories are unique and fun enough to standalone as palette cleansers between other reads, but read together as intended adds more depth and complexity to the characters than the number of pages per story would lead you to believe possible. That’s a testament to Jared’s writing. Well written and smart prose with humor injected at all the right moments. I’m typically a stone-faced reader, but this book surprisingly cracked me because I both laughed and shed a tear. It’s not just a story about robots, but it’s an ode to life. Brilliantly bookended but I’m definitely left excited for whatever Jared writes next. I highly recommend this book to anyone curious enough to be passing through these reviews.
June 17, 2025
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book by Jared Bentley. The style of building a world with a bunch of semi-connected shorter stories instead of one longer narrative reminds me of Tales from the Perilous Realm by Tolkien. That book is definitely less cohesive, but the style is overall quite similar. I particularly liked the progression of SKYL-R bot's story and the recurring bit of Sheers glorious return to ops.
The themes covered remind me a bit of Meditations on Moloch, which is an analysis of the famous poem about Moloch by Allen Ginsberg. In it the author writes on greed, human ambition, capitalism, and the issues of modern society's drive for endless competition. Similarity, this book touches on many of the same ideas while presenting them in a new, unique way.
I found this book to be an interesting anthology that covers deep themes with a fun twist. Through a future world where humans and robots must learn to live with each other, the author explores not only present issues, but what might happen when we’re not the only intelligent species on this planet.
The themes covered remind me a bit of Meditations on Moloch, which is an analysis of the famous poem about Moloch by Allen Ginsberg. In it the author writes on greed, human ambition, capitalism, and the issues of modern society's drive for endless competition. Similarity, this book touches on many of the same ideas while presenting them in a new, unique way.
I found this book to be an interesting anthology that covers deep themes with a fun twist. Through a future world where humans and robots must learn to live with each other, the author explores not only present issues, but what might happen when we’re not the only intelligent species on this planet.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 23, 2025
Robots, Please was a delightful read. I have no background whatsoever in anything related to robotics, but I was still able to fully appreciate and enjoy it. Right from the start it's a vivid exploration of what the future of our AI world could possibly be. I was especially intrigued by the human qualities that the robots possessed and that made it very palatable for the non-robotic me. What kept the whole book going, however, was the author's clever weaving of the possible repercussions that our current world might have on the the future of this world and beyond.
June 22, 2025
Jared Bentley's Robots, Please gives the rare glimpse into humanity from the view of robot civilization. He does really well with the continuity throughout the series of short stories and his use of gripping tie-ins to modern day themes compells the reader to invest in his characters. This is a win for Bentley, I can't wait to see what he comes out with next.
July 15, 2025
This a new genre for me but it is something that has my attention. The writing is very clever and fun.
But not all stories will hit the same and I think that's just to keep you sucked in and wondering what the next story will be. I really like the repeating characters and how they follow the different story lines.
But not all stories will hit the same and I think that's just to keep you sucked in and wondering what the next story will be. I really like the repeating characters and how they follow the different story lines.
July 15, 2025
It was a short book of short stories about robots and humans in society together. Full of humor and lessons, it was a nice quick enjoyable read
September 20, 2025
Fun, quick, unique, futuristic stories.
August 26, 2025
A pleasant surprise! When I first started this book, I didn’t know that it was short stories, which is not something I would typically read but I loved it and I’m excited for more. It’s funny and thrilling at times, some stories I thought were kind of scary but every one I enjoyed! Each story is its own but they are all in the same world and connect!
I got a chance to talk to the author about this book and it made me appreciate the book a lot more, I think I’ll read it again before the second one drops!
I got a chance to talk to the author about this book and it made me appreciate the book a lot more, I think I’ll read it again before the second one drops!
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews