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The Amateurs
In the style of Margaret Atwood's The Year of the Flood, Dave Eggers' The Circle, and The Walking Dead a post-apocalyptic examination of nostalgia, loss and the possibility of starting over.
Allow us to introduce you to the newest product from PINA, the world's largest tech company. "Port" is a curiously irresistible device that offers the impossible: space-time travel mysteriously powered by nostalgia and longing. Step inside a Port and find yourself transported to wherever and whenever your heart desires: a bygone youth, a dreamed-of future, the fabled past.
In the near-future world of Liz Harmer's extraordinary novel, Port becomes a phenomenon, but soon it is clear that many who pass through its portal won't be coming back--either unwilling to return or, more ominously, unable to do so. After a few short years, the population plummets. The grid goes down. Among those who remain is Marie, a thirty-something artist living in a small community of Port-resistors camping out in the abandoned mansions of a former steel town. As winter approaches the group considers heading south, but Marie clings to the hope that her long lost lover will one day return to the spot where he disappeared.
Meanwhile, PINA's corporate campus in California has become a cultish enclave of survivors. Brandon, the right-hand man to the mad genius who invented Port, decides to get out. He steals a car and drives north-east, where he hopes to find his missing mother. And there he meets Marie.
The Amateurs is a story of rapture and romance, and an astoundingly powerful debut about what happens when technology meets desire.
Allow us to introduce you to the newest product from PINA, the world's largest tech company. "Port" is a curiously irresistible device that offers the impossible: space-time travel mysteriously powered by nostalgia and longing. Step inside a Port and find yourself transported to wherever and whenever your heart desires: a bygone youth, a dreamed-of future, the fabled past.
In the near-future world of Liz Harmer's extraordinary novel, Port becomes a phenomenon, but soon it is clear that many who pass through its portal won't be coming back--either unwilling to return or, more ominously, unable to do so. After a few short years, the population plummets. The grid goes down. Among those who remain is Marie, a thirty-something artist living in a small community of Port-resistors camping out in the abandoned mansions of a former steel town. As winter approaches the group considers heading south, but Marie clings to the hope that her long lost lover will one day return to the spot where he disappeared.
Meanwhile, PINA's corporate campus in California has become a cultish enclave of survivors. Brandon, the right-hand man to the mad genius who invented Port, decides to get out. He steals a car and drives north-east, where he hopes to find his missing mother. And there he meets Marie.
The Amateurs is a story of rapture and romance, and an astoundingly powerful debut about what happens when technology meets desire.
328 pages, Paperback
First published March 21, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 111 reviews
November 25, 2018
I guess it's okay to rate one's own book.
January 16, 2021
I didn't really understand this book. It had an intriguing premise—sort of like an episode of Black Mirror mixed with the atmosphere of Station Eleven—but the execution left something to be desired.
We follow the survivors, mainly Marie, in Toronto after much of the population has stepped through 'ports' into other worlds. She is among a group of about forty survivors who have resisted the urge to leave through a port. The ports are essentially portals created by an Apple-like company, conveniently called PINA (with a pineapple logo, hence the cover) and slowly take over the world. Millions, if not billions, of humans have disappeared through these portals, and though PINA's CEO, Albrecht Doors, says the leavers can return...no one has.
Then we follow Brandon Dreyer, Doors' right hand man at PINA, who is uncovering information that will shape his view of the ports and ultimately his fate. Eventually Marie and Brandon's stories will intertwine, though why, how and to what effect they do so still remains a bit of a mystery to me.
I was compelled enough to complete this book because I wanted to see how it ended. The premise, as I said, was engaging and genuinely piqued my curiosity. However, along the way I felt a total lack of connection to the characters or the world we are in. Unlike Station Eleven like I mentioned, this book is totally lacking in atmosphere. There was such a big opportunity here to develop a post-apocalyptic world and examine the politics, relationships and contention with nature that would come with 99% of humans disappearing. However, we focus so much on the past that we barely get a hold on what's going on in the present.
Marie's storyline is largely flashbacks or her memories of her life before the ports. There's very little we get about Brandon as a person at all. And so when the two stories meet, other than wondering what this would do for the plot, I didn't care at all about them as people.
I don't have much else to say about this book except that I didn't get it. I can't tell if it was just poorly developed or maybe I missed something? If you've read this and have a different opinion, I'd honestly love to know. But otherwise I can't really see what's special about this one and it feels like a book that will slip from my mind over time.
We follow the survivors, mainly Marie, in Toronto after much of the population has stepped through 'ports' into other worlds. She is among a group of about forty survivors who have resisted the urge to leave through a port. The ports are essentially portals created by an Apple-like company, conveniently called PINA (with a pineapple logo, hence the cover) and slowly take over the world. Millions, if not billions, of humans have disappeared through these portals, and though PINA's CEO, Albrecht Doors, says the leavers can return...no one has.
Then we follow Brandon Dreyer, Doors' right hand man at PINA, who is uncovering information that will shape his view of the ports and ultimately his fate. Eventually Marie and Brandon's stories will intertwine, though why, how and to what effect they do so still remains a bit of a mystery to me.
I was compelled enough to complete this book because I wanted to see how it ended. The premise, as I said, was engaging and genuinely piqued my curiosity. However, along the way I felt a total lack of connection to the characters or the world we are in. Unlike Station Eleven like I mentioned, this book is totally lacking in atmosphere. There was such a big opportunity here to develop a post-apocalyptic world and examine the politics, relationships and contention with nature that would come with 99% of humans disappearing. However, we focus so much on the past that we barely get a hold on what's going on in the present.
Marie's storyline is largely flashbacks or her memories of her life before the ports. There's very little we get about Brandon as a person at all. And so when the two stories meet, other than wondering what this would do for the plot, I didn't care at all about them as people.
I don't have much else to say about this book except that I didn't get it. I can't tell if it was just poorly developed or maybe I missed something? If you've read this and have a different opinion, I'd honestly love to know. But otherwise I can't really see what's special about this one and it feels like a book that will slip from my mind over time.
March 26, 2017
This book had everything going for it. A cool, futuristic technology involving time travel; an apocalyptic setting; a Station Eleven feel...but after trying very hard to get into it, I could not read another page. Maybe it's the lack of action, maybe it's the nonchalant wasting-away of the characters, but I couldn't take it any longer. In the end, the book didn't have anything special to carry me through the end. It's just another quiet apocalypse and humanity is just as boringly flawed as it was before. Ports or no ports. The thing that bothered me the most is that even 100+ books in I had no conception of the world the characters were living in. The atmosphere and world-building were fog-thin. So sad to make this my first DNF of the year.
May 23, 2019
The Amateurs by Liz Harmer is hard to slot into one category; it’s literary, philosophical, dystopian and science fiction, all within 300-ish pages. Even the publishers had to use other books like The Leftovers by Tom Perotta, The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood, and The Circle by Dave Eggers to describe what this book is similar to. Did it succeed in keeping my interest, even though it was all over the place in space, time and location? To be honest, I’m still pondering that, but the fact that I’m still thinking about the book even though I finished it a while ago is a good thing.
Marie is our protagonist, and she lives in a world that has been mostly emptied of humans, as far as she knows. A few years ago, a google-like company called PINA (with a pineapple logo) invented ‘ports’ which claimed to transport people to any time or location they desired, simply by walking through the port and thinking of where they wanted to go. The problem is, no one came back through these ports, so all human infrastructure is crumbling with not enough people to tend to it. Marie is living in a town with about 30 other people, and for those who are from Ontario Canada, you will recognize this city as Hamilton. For those who aren’t aware, this city gets very cold in the winter (as most Canadian cities do) so the remaining inhabitants are trying to decide whether they head south to a climate that’s easier to grow food in. They’re hesitant to leave because they a) aren’t sure what to expect when they leave their familiar confines and b) still hold out hope their loved ones may return through the local ports they left in.
There’s two other narratives to this book, one being a short interlude in which we follow a somewhat minor character through the port to discover what he finds on the other side (and obviously I’m not going to tell you anymore about that because it will ruin the surprise!). The second is a section that focuses on the remaining employees of PINA and what it’s like to live in the PINA compound now that most of the employees have gone through the ports themselves. This is when we peripherally meet Albrecht Doors, the mad genius who ‘discovered’ the ports, who very tellingly, has not entered one himself (hello red flag!). We also learn that the ports have the ability to coerce people, which is when we explore the idea of them being a type of highly sophisticated artificial intelligence. One PINA employee in particular breaks free of the cult-like environment and heads up north to his hometown, so readers get a glimpse into the life of the remaining population elsewhere.
I don’t think I’m alone when I say dystopian novels are fascinating. My favourite part is learning about the steps that society follows when things begin to fall apart and the day-to-day conditions people are left with. These types of books act as a warning and additional fodder for the already anxious among us. Despite the urgent nature of the plot, The Amateurs slows us right now, taking the time to sit in people’s heads and explore the nature of desire and how controlling it can be. PINA is so closely modelled after Google in this book that it doesn’t take a huge leap of the imagination to see how our own world could fall into the same kind of disarray. In many ways PINA’s power was positive, for instance it released a product called BioBark which converted carbon dioxide to energy, but there is always a darker side to progress and this all encompassing corporation eventually entered that realm.
The only thing I didn’t like about this book was all the philosophizing, I wished the plot had moved a bit quicker in that sense. But, I also found the premise unique and exciting, which propelled me through the pages at a decent pace. This book isn’t for everyone, but it will most certainly appeal to those looking for an adventure that takes place in a closely-related reality to our own.
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June 5, 2018
This is one of those types of reads that is difficult yet worthy of making one’s way through the book and pondering over the themes for a few minutes at the end. Most of our lives are filled with muddled thoughts and fragile emotions and Harmer has brilliantly explored what would happen to us beings if our devices brought out an element of human nature that would ruin civilization. The wording is perfectly crafted and planned. This book took Harmer a bit of time to produce and her time was certainly worth the effort she put into it. This would be a perfect read for a book club to use and discuss.
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May 7, 2019
I find it interesting to consider what influences your opinion of a book while reading. The big thing that spurred this thought along was a passage in The Amateurs where the protagonist, Marie, realizes how starkly unique she is just before discussing architecture influenced by architecture influenced by architecture. (I won’t directly quote it because the passage may change significantly from my advance reading copy before publication.) I read it and wondered whether what I saw as a joke about narcissism blinding someone to her commonness was intentional or not. Given what I’d experienced up to that point, I honestly suspected that the truth had more to do with the statements being wholly separate, at the service of characterization and world-building, with no thought regarding what I saw as to their interrelated nature. And, as I didn’t seem to be very generous with my interpretation of the author’s intentions, I’d obviously cultivated a low opinion of Harmer and her work up to that point, which also meant that I likely wasn’t enjoying the book.
And it’s unfortunate, because The Amateurs sounded like something I could really get into. It’s the near future, and time machines (ports) have become widely available throughout the world. The problem is people who go in don’t seem to come back, intentionally or otherwise, and the global population majorly dropped off as a result, followed by a crumbling of the basic infrastructure that held society together. The story moves between a small community working to survive in a large, all but abandoned, urban environment and what remains of the company that made the ports––the latter living on a sequestered compound with a growing religious-cultish vibe. Both groups are growing increasingly desperate as resources dwindle, and fear they need to strike out into the great unknown beyond their immediate surroundings.
I don’t feel that this synopsis necessarily does the book justice, but I think it’s one of the best I can come up with to explain things succinctly. On the one side, the story has a lot to do with Marie’s reluctance to move on while she clings to the hope that her ex-husband will return after vanishing through a port; on the other, it follows Brandon––we’ll call him the secondary protagonist––as he uncovers evidence that his boss, the ports’ inventor, had a much greater understanding of the dangers of these machines than he let on. In all honesty, however, not too much happens. The Amateurs is more about the setting than the plot, basically trying to explain what happened to the world and what the ports actually are. And, even when things seem to be moving forward toward something resembling a plot, Harmer frequently interrupts any suspense or momentum she starts to cultivate in order to give us more background on her apocalypse. Add to this the fact that the two major storylines intersect, interrupting each other without having a satisfactory resolution to either, despite both seeming relatively straightforward, independently. It starts to feel as though the story is told out of sequence––not necessarily a novel concept for a time travel narrative, but troublesome in this instance both because this makes things confusing and because I struggle to find the purpose for choosing to do so. The payoff or the strong cohesive thread that makes this worthwhile is either nonexistent or I was at least too stupid to find it.
Now, upon finishing The Amateurs, I was hit with a sense that Harmer’s world-building was problematic, but perhaps for misguided reasons. Beyond the characters’ immediate surroundings, we learn very little about the setting. I was able to justify keeping readers in the dark as mirroring the characters being cut off from the world after the grid went down, but I started to question it when Brandon travels between our two main settings without seemingly revealing much of this presumably barren North America. However, we did take a brief interlude into a vibrant colony of people on the way, people who seem to be doing just fine and who welcome Brandon with open arms and generosity. I realize now that my dissatisfaction has less to do with a problem describing the setting, and more a problem with the setting lacking danger, with only kind, respectful people being left after the apocalypse. Even things presented as potentially dangerous, such as a stranger hiding out on the fringes of Marie’s community, are met with such a lack of concern by everyone that the author immediately cultivates the same mentality within the readers––this reader, at least. And the ease with which Brandon assembles supplies and leaves his former boss’ fortified compound effectively kills any attempts to present their new society as a frightening dictatorship.
So, I really don’t have a lot of great things to say about The Amateurs, but it’s possible that I misunderstood a great deal of it. It comes across as an attempt at some sort of metaphysical thought experiment or a commentary about nostalgia clouding our judgment, about unhealthy ways people ineffectively cope with loss, but what comes out more clearly is a superficial expression of Harmer’s low opinion of modern society.
And it’s unfortunate, because The Amateurs sounded like something I could really get into. It’s the near future, and time machines (ports) have become widely available throughout the world. The problem is people who go in don’t seem to come back, intentionally or otherwise, and the global population majorly dropped off as a result, followed by a crumbling of the basic infrastructure that held society together. The story moves between a small community working to survive in a large, all but abandoned, urban environment and what remains of the company that made the ports––the latter living on a sequestered compound with a growing religious-cultish vibe. Both groups are growing increasingly desperate as resources dwindle, and fear they need to strike out into the great unknown beyond their immediate surroundings.
I don’t feel that this synopsis necessarily does the book justice, but I think it’s one of the best I can come up with to explain things succinctly. On the one side, the story has a lot to do with Marie’s reluctance to move on while she clings to the hope that her ex-husband will return after vanishing through a port; on the other, it follows Brandon––we’ll call him the secondary protagonist––as he uncovers evidence that his boss, the ports’ inventor, had a much greater understanding of the dangers of these machines than he let on. In all honesty, however, not too much happens. The Amateurs is more about the setting than the plot, basically trying to explain what happened to the world and what the ports actually are. And, even when things seem to be moving forward toward something resembling a plot, Harmer frequently interrupts any suspense or momentum she starts to cultivate in order to give us more background on her apocalypse. Add to this the fact that the two major storylines intersect, interrupting each other without having a satisfactory resolution to either, despite both seeming relatively straightforward, independently. It starts to feel as though the story is told out of sequence––not necessarily a novel concept for a time travel narrative, but troublesome in this instance both because this makes things confusing and because I struggle to find the purpose for choosing to do so. The payoff or the strong cohesive thread that makes this worthwhile is either nonexistent or I was at least too stupid to find it.
Now, upon finishing The Amateurs, I was hit with a sense that Harmer’s world-building was problematic, but perhaps for misguided reasons. Beyond the characters’ immediate surroundings, we learn very little about the setting. I was able to justify keeping readers in the dark as mirroring the characters being cut off from the world after the grid went down, but I started to question it when Brandon travels between our two main settings without seemingly revealing much of this presumably barren North America. However, we did take a brief interlude into a vibrant colony of people on the way, people who seem to be doing just fine and who welcome Brandon with open arms and generosity. I realize now that my dissatisfaction has less to do with a problem describing the setting, and more a problem with the setting lacking danger, with only kind, respectful people being left after the apocalypse. Even things presented as potentially dangerous, such as a stranger hiding out on the fringes of Marie’s community, are met with such a lack of concern by everyone that the author immediately cultivates the same mentality within the readers––this reader, at least. And the ease with which Brandon assembles supplies and leaves his former boss’ fortified compound effectively kills any attempts to present their new society as a frightening dictatorship.
So, I really don’t have a lot of great things to say about The Amateurs, but it’s possible that I misunderstood a great deal of it. It comes across as an attempt at some sort of metaphysical thought experiment or a commentary about nostalgia clouding our judgment, about unhealthy ways people ineffectively cope with loss, but what comes out more clearly is a superficial expression of Harmer’s low opinion of modern society.
dnf
November 5, 2018The premise ticked off some good boxes for me: post-apocalyptic setting, technology gone wrong, alternating perspectives, Canadian bleak. But it was too slow-moving for my taste, and I just had trouble buying into the idea of the ports.
January 3, 2019
The Amateurs sustained my attention from start to finish. Her cultural and religious critique is embedded in sparse prose. The book feels like a blend of Douglas Copeland's Life after God, sci-fi fantasy, and lots and lots of earthy Canadian fiction. Concrete details about locations abound. She moves the action between a survivor's colony in Hamilton Ontario and the technological centre of PINA in California, making for a series of refreshing location and character changes. It had a cool vibe.
Harmer takes some risks in asking us to buy into the technological centre piece of the book, which is the ports technology, but at the same time we who remember the pre-digital age note the similarities to our own world, now madly in love with not just smartphones but AI technologies. She lands the novel reasonably well too, without spoiling the weird mystery of why humans seemingly choose the unknown over the concrete reality of our everyday world.
Harmer takes some risks in asking us to buy into the technological centre piece of the book, which is the ports technology, but at the same time we who remember the pre-digital age note the similarities to our own world, now madly in love with not just smartphones but AI technologies. She lands the novel reasonably well too, without spoiling the weird mystery of why humans seemingly choose the unknown over the concrete reality of our everyday world.
January 29, 2018
A bold, wry, brilliant, atmospheric thought experiment and cultural commentary. Feels both human and metaphysical. It takes you into crazy Ports where computers merge with everyone's historical nostalgia. It's nuts, I loved it.
August 7, 2019
Contains a surprisingly large amount of information on the post-apocalyptic activities of raccoons.
April 17, 2017
Please read all of my reviews at http://ultraviolentlit.blogspot.ca!
In a world very similar to our own, the largest tech company in the world is PINA (with their logo being a stylized pineapple – remind you of any other companies?), and they have just released an astonishing new product called Port. It is a human-sized pod that offers space-time travel and is powered by nostalgia for the past and the desire to return there. Step inside the port with any time and location in mind, and Port will take you there.
But there is one downfall – Port was released with very little research done, and it was discovered too late that very few people will return from their journeys into the past. No one knows whether they have been swallowed into the fabric of time, or whether they simply do not wish to come back to the real world. And on top of these mysteries, it is soon discovered that the ports are seductive, and they adapt to the people around them with possible intelligence, convincing consumers to enter Port against their wishes. Before long, almost everyone is gone.
The few people that remain in our reality include a small group of hold-outs gathered together in an old church in an unidentified northeastern city. There are about forty people in the group that becomes more like a dysfunctional family, despite their differences. Most members of the group have lost someone to Port – including Marie, who is waiting hopefully for the return of her beloved ex-husband, Jason. She reminisces about their past together to anyone who will listen, despite the fact that he seems egotistical and generally awful. Even though Marie has resisted Port, she is still held prisoner by her nostalgia for an idealized past.
In a parallel storyline, we meet Brandon, head of public relations at PINA during the development, release and aftermath of Port. We learn about the enclave of PINA employees that have been holed up in California since the collapse of civilization as we know it, and see Brandon’s development as he gradually becomes disillusioned with his mentor, Albrecht Doors – the creator of PINA and mastermind behind Port. When Brandon finds out some devastating secrets about Port, he escapes from PINA headquarters and heads north-east to find his estranged mother. Along the way, his path collides with Marie.
The Amateurs reminded me a lot of Atwood’s Oryx & Crake, both in structure and tone. First the post-apocalyptic world is shown, and then the details of the Port technology are explained, and we see how the world as we know it came to be destroyed. The characters are realistic, shown with all their distinct, realistic faults. Despite living in a dystopian near-future, the people in Marie’s group still must deal with the everyday problems of self-doubt, romance, and generally getting along with each other. Their interactions are human and relatable, even at the end of the world.
The idea of Port is intriguing, especially as it extrapolates on how technology can seduce us into sacrificing reality for potentiality. The novel becomes a parable for the ways that our own modern society is disappearing into technology, and shows that even in our desperation to move forward into the future, we have a deep-rooted desire for the past. There is irony in the fact that a complex, futuristic technology is used to access the nostalgia for a simpler past, but it shows how we are unable to resist new and shiny toys, despite the risks. There are biblical undertones here too, underlined in the ending to the novel: “[E]very box, you opened. Every fruit, you ate. You wanted to know. Here you are: here is the story you need.” (Loc. 3903) If The Amateurs at the very least causes readers to question our unthinking acceptance of new technology and those who control it, then yes, it is the story we need.
I received this book from Knopf Canada and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
In a world very similar to our own, the largest tech company in the world is PINA (with their logo being a stylized pineapple – remind you of any other companies?), and they have just released an astonishing new product called Port. It is a human-sized pod that offers space-time travel and is powered by nostalgia for the past and the desire to return there. Step inside the port with any time and location in mind, and Port will take you there.
But there is one downfall – Port was released with very little research done, and it was discovered too late that very few people will return from their journeys into the past. No one knows whether they have been swallowed into the fabric of time, or whether they simply do not wish to come back to the real world. And on top of these mysteries, it is soon discovered that the ports are seductive, and they adapt to the people around them with possible intelligence, convincing consumers to enter Port against their wishes. Before long, almost everyone is gone.
The few people that remain in our reality include a small group of hold-outs gathered together in an old church in an unidentified northeastern city. There are about forty people in the group that becomes more like a dysfunctional family, despite their differences. Most members of the group have lost someone to Port – including Marie, who is waiting hopefully for the return of her beloved ex-husband, Jason. She reminisces about their past together to anyone who will listen, despite the fact that he seems egotistical and generally awful. Even though Marie has resisted Port, she is still held prisoner by her nostalgia for an idealized past.
In a parallel storyline, we meet Brandon, head of public relations at PINA during the development, release and aftermath of Port. We learn about the enclave of PINA employees that have been holed up in California since the collapse of civilization as we know it, and see Brandon’s development as he gradually becomes disillusioned with his mentor, Albrecht Doors – the creator of PINA and mastermind behind Port. When Brandon finds out some devastating secrets about Port, he escapes from PINA headquarters and heads north-east to find his estranged mother. Along the way, his path collides with Marie.
The Amateurs reminded me a lot of Atwood’s Oryx & Crake, both in structure and tone. First the post-apocalyptic world is shown, and then the details of the Port technology are explained, and we see how the world as we know it came to be destroyed. The characters are realistic, shown with all their distinct, realistic faults. Despite living in a dystopian near-future, the people in Marie’s group still must deal with the everyday problems of self-doubt, romance, and generally getting along with each other. Their interactions are human and relatable, even at the end of the world.
The idea of Port is intriguing, especially as it extrapolates on how technology can seduce us into sacrificing reality for potentiality. The novel becomes a parable for the ways that our own modern society is disappearing into technology, and shows that even in our desperation to move forward into the future, we have a deep-rooted desire for the past. There is irony in the fact that a complex, futuristic technology is used to access the nostalgia for a simpler past, but it shows how we are unable to resist new and shiny toys, despite the risks. There are biblical undertones here too, underlined in the ending to the novel: “[E]very box, you opened. Every fruit, you ate. You wanted to know. Here you are: here is the story you need.” (Loc. 3903) If The Amateurs at the very least causes readers to question our unthinking acceptance of new technology and those who control it, then yes, it is the story we need.
I received this book from Knopf Canada and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
July 1, 2019
I really gave this one an earnest try. I read 137 out of 325 pages. I was drawn in by the fantastic cover, and by the descriptions and reviews on the covers that called it "tense and fast-paced", and talked about the "...powerful alchemy that happens when technology meets desire." OK, I'm down for all those things.
Maybe the publishers put the wrong text inside these covers, but I found this to be a boring, meandering, flaccid book. I'm okay with taking my time to sink into a book, but there was nothing to sink into here for me. Instead of characters there was just a long list of proper names, with perhaps one vague personality trait attached to that name, but I never had any sense of understanding, or caring about, the characters behind the names.
There was minimal action, pretty ludicrous "sexy" scenes, no tension or suspense, and the narrative seemed to dribble back and forth between flashbacks and scenes set in the present.
Was this just bad writing, by someone with a good agent? Was it a subtle satire of "sexy" technology and survival stories? Was it the work of a masterful writer who was purposely distancing the reader from the actual story through the use of hackneyed characters and dialogue? Am I just an idiot?
I'm going to answer yes, no, no, and definitely not to the questions above. There are so many good books out there. I'm sorry I spent 3 weeks on this one. Sigh.
Maybe the publishers put the wrong text inside these covers, but I found this to be a boring, meandering, flaccid book. I'm okay with taking my time to sink into a book, but there was nothing to sink into here for me. Instead of characters there was just a long list of proper names, with perhaps one vague personality trait attached to that name, but I never had any sense of understanding, or caring about, the characters behind the names.
There was minimal action, pretty ludicrous "sexy" scenes, no tension or suspense, and the narrative seemed to dribble back and forth between flashbacks and scenes set in the present.
Was this just bad writing, by someone with a good agent? Was it a subtle satire of "sexy" technology and survival stories? Was it the work of a masterful writer who was purposely distancing the reader from the actual story through the use of hackneyed characters and dialogue? Am I just an idiot?
I'm going to answer yes, no, no, and definitely not to the questions above. There are so many good books out there. I'm sorry I spent 3 weeks on this one. Sigh.
June 25, 2018
3.5 This book deals with a dystopian world. I was intrigued by the book's setting in Hamilton, Ontario and could visualise many of the places described by the author. Also surprised to discover, at the end of the book in the acknowledgements section that I know the author's parents through church and educational settings, so that was fun too.
The plot and characters are very engaging. A tech company on the West Coast, PINA, has moved on from their phones to the new technology of "Port". The claim is that Port is like a time machine which can transport owners to any time and place in history so you can experience "first hand" knowledge in a whole new way. However, those "left behind" are wondering where their loved ones really disappeared to, and if and when they will return. They're also literally struggling to adapt to and survive in this entirely new world. Very well written and thought provoking. Who are we as humans and what are we doing with technology and who is in control?
The plot and characters are very engaging. A tech company on the West Coast, PINA, has moved on from their phones to the new technology of "Port". The claim is that Port is like a time machine which can transport owners to any time and place in history so you can experience "first hand" knowledge in a whole new way. However, those "left behind" are wondering where their loved ones really disappeared to, and if and when they will return. They're also literally struggling to adapt to and survive in this entirely new world. Very well written and thought provoking. Who are we as humans and what are we doing with technology and who is in control?
June 24, 2018
I've never been a huge fan of the time-travel genre but what I really liked about this book was that it flipped the experience to create a central mystery. What happens if you refuse to enter the machine and slowly watch the world around you change? I liked that it didn't throw in genre-specific peril (cheesy climaxes, power mad demagogues), without acknowledging the more realistic underpinning of those fears. There was a certain poetry to this book that made me really enjoy it.
October 4, 2019
This book had so much potential! A future apocalypse, a scary similarity to companies like Amazon and Google and Apple, and yet, it fell soooo short. I appreciated the different chapters going back and forth between time travel and characters, but it was so slow and I don't feel like anything even happened. I learned nothing about the characters or the world they were in and there was no action to the plot whatsoever.
October 15, 2018
It had its moments, but overall lacked *something*. I was left with the impression that the author was as unclear about the functioning of the ports as I was.
Read
June 7, 2018I am suddenly not feeling this book. There's too much telling and not showing. Life is short.
No star rating. It's just not my jam.
No star rating. It's just not my jam.
April 8, 2023
very "Station Eleven" vibes (which i loved).
March 8, 2021
This is a book that had all the potential for me, some really interesting elements to this version of the apocalypse. But in the end I did not really like the direction Harmer decided to take her tale, and I also struggled with the structure she chose to tell it in. Which basically is a premise vs. execution dilemma and as much as I am all here for a great premise, it just isn't enough on its own.
I have said before that my personal preferred type of narration is a single perspective (can be 1st, 2nd or 3rd person) but I can definitely get behind a big cast and switching behind multiple perspective, several of my favorite novels do that. What I really don't like though is when for a really long time you follow one POV and then suddenly, let's say at around 80 pages, we move to a different POV. Done this way I have to regain the momentum of the novel and my footing in it, I mean I just had really gotten into it and was enjoying myself and then it is as if I have to start over again, especially since this new character here was in a completely different setting. I never like it when writers do this, I mean who thinks this a good idea? Do one or do multiple POVs but don't pretend I am with a single voice and the pull that away from me. By the end, these 2 storylines will, of course, meet but I know I would have preferred this with a more regular back and forth between them. Harmer actually repeats this choice about half way in to give us an interlude with a 3rd person, meaning that the flow of this novel is interrupted again. I didn't like it and think this interlude was rather pointless for the big picture.
But let's talk plot. The concept here is great and there are some neat ideas within it. A company named PINA (as in PINAPPLE) invents Ports which can transport you do any time and place you desire. Quickly the world empties out of people when no one is coming back, and the left behinds are coming to terms with an empty country. Initially set in an unnamed city, we later also dive into the organization of PINA and learn that the Ports might have been more twisted than it seems... Such a great start. PINA is of course Apple and the Ports are such a great stand in for people disappearing behind their screens and changing with that the world as we know it. There is some great criticism, some great metaphors, just good commentary that in the end didn't go as far as I wanted it to but I was fine with what I got. I also thoroughly enjoyed the set up of people scraping by in this new world without the security of society and the task of finding meaning and purpose in the new now. It's a very soft apocalypse without much violence or threats but a very interesting one, at least the basic construct is. Our main girl bonds with a dog, explorations of loneliness: I was invested. Starting with switching up the perspective it all started to slip away from me. The closer to the end the more this novel wanted to focus on a love triangle, the more details we got about PINA the less I cared about our eyes inside the company because he frankly was a whiny idiot who then gets promoted to handsome love interest and I was out. I didn't care anymore. Also, this would have been better with not giving us hints and actual footage from the destinations of the ports. Just saying.
The more it went on, the less it touched on the things I wanted to read about. I didn't care for most of the characters, even the dog left me a bit cold later on and that never happens. I think a lot of it failed with the perspective change but I also feel like the amount of what Harmer had to say of interest in here would have worked better in a shorter work, let's say a novella. This isn't bad, it was just very underwhelming for me.
2.5*
I have said before that my personal preferred type of narration is a single perspective (can be 1st, 2nd or 3rd person) but I can definitely get behind a big cast and switching behind multiple perspective, several of my favorite novels do that. What I really don't like though is when for a really long time you follow one POV and then suddenly, let's say at around 80 pages, we move to a different POV. Done this way I have to regain the momentum of the novel and my footing in it, I mean I just had really gotten into it and was enjoying myself and then it is as if I have to start over again, especially since this new character here was in a completely different setting. I never like it when writers do this, I mean who thinks this a good idea? Do one or do multiple POVs but don't pretend I am with a single voice and the pull that away from me. By the end, these 2 storylines will, of course, meet but I know I would have preferred this with a more regular back and forth between them. Harmer actually repeats this choice about half way in to give us an interlude with a 3rd person, meaning that the flow of this novel is interrupted again. I didn't like it and think this interlude was rather pointless for the big picture.
But let's talk plot. The concept here is great and there are some neat ideas within it. A company named PINA (as in PINAPPLE) invents Ports which can transport you do any time and place you desire. Quickly the world empties out of people when no one is coming back, and the left behinds are coming to terms with an empty country. Initially set in an unnamed city, we later also dive into the organization of PINA and learn that the Ports might have been more twisted than it seems... Such a great start. PINA is of course Apple and the Ports are such a great stand in for people disappearing behind their screens and changing with that the world as we know it. There is some great criticism, some great metaphors, just good commentary that in the end didn't go as far as I wanted it to but I was fine with what I got. I also thoroughly enjoyed the set up of people scraping by in this new world without the security of society and the task of finding meaning and purpose in the new now. It's a very soft apocalypse without much violence or threats but a very interesting one, at least the basic construct is. Our main girl bonds with a dog, explorations of loneliness: I was invested. Starting with switching up the perspective it all started to slip away from me. The closer to the end the more this novel wanted to focus on a love triangle, the more details we got about PINA the less I cared about our eyes inside the company because he frankly was a whiny idiot who then gets promoted to handsome love interest and I was out. I didn't care anymore. Also, this would have been better with not giving us hints and actual footage from the destinations of the ports. Just saying.
The more it went on, the less it touched on the things I wanted to read about. I didn't care for most of the characters, even the dog left me a bit cold later on and that never happens. I think a lot of it failed with the perspective change but I also feel like the amount of what Harmer had to say of interest in here would have worked better in a shorter work, let's say a novella. This isn't bad, it was just very underwhelming for me.
2.5*
July 13, 2023
This book had a strong start for me because as a resident of the city where the story mostly takes place I was immediately drawn in. The descriptions of Hamilton were written as only someone who’s lived here could do and I liked that a lot. The premise was intriguing with the entire global population except for 40 people in Hamilton having gone into time travel Ports that allow people to visit any place or time. The people left behind had no way of knowing if others were similarly left behind and had to do their best to support each other to survive. They’ve been told that people who enter the Ports can come back whenever they want, but no one ever does. We are introduced to Marie, an artist, who chose not to enter a Port and now spends her time obsessing over a life she once had.
Eventually we learn about another group of about 1000 people, all employees of PINA, the company that introduced the Ports including the founder, Albrecht Doors. Like some sort of Steve Jobs type character he rules over his employees as an almost godlike figure but there’s nothing about the man as he is described that makes it believable that anyone could believe this about him. I found this section much longer than it needed to be. Eventually one of his number leaves to try to find his mother in his hometown of, you guessed it, Hamilton. His journey back to Hamilton across a land largely devoid of life should have been the novel. Marie reminiscing about her failed marriage, the yoga classes and office politics of PINA were the meat of the book when they should have only been a few short chapters.
At one point we unexpectedly see a character enter a Port and we learn what happens to them. Whether their experience was typical we never really learn. It just felt random.
The concept was great and I really wanted to like this more but it didn’t live up to its potential for me and I didn’t find the ending satisfying. Any of the big reveals that occurred towards the end of the book were kind of a letdown.
That being said, I read to the end because I was intrigued to find out where the author was taking the story. The characters were mostly likeable and they existed within interesting situations and I wanted to know more about where they’d wind up.
Eventually we learn about another group of about 1000 people, all employees of PINA, the company that introduced the Ports including the founder, Albrecht Doors. Like some sort of Steve Jobs type character he rules over his employees as an almost godlike figure but there’s nothing about the man as he is described that makes it believable that anyone could believe this about him. I found this section much longer than it needed to be. Eventually one of his number leaves to try to find his mother in his hometown of, you guessed it, Hamilton. His journey back to Hamilton across a land largely devoid of life should have been the novel. Marie reminiscing about her failed marriage, the yoga classes and office politics of PINA were the meat of the book when they should have only been a few short chapters.
At one point we unexpectedly see a character enter a Port and we learn what happens to them. Whether their experience was typical we never really learn. It just felt random.
The concept was great and I really wanted to like this more but it didn’t live up to its potential for me and I didn’t find the ending satisfying. Any of the big reveals that occurred towards the end of the book were kind of a letdown.
That being said, I read to the end because I was intrigued to find out where the author was taking the story. The characters were mostly likeable and they existed within interesting situations and I wanted to know more about where they’d wind up.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 7, 2025
I wanted to like this book so bad, but I couldn't. The whole premise of a device that can allow people to travel to different dimensions is great, just right up my alley as a sci-fi enthusiast.
However, this story seems to be all over the place and the pace it's too slow for it to be captivating. The world building is also not the best, at least after the first group of characters is presented.
Moving from one storyline to another, the book feels like if it's telling lots of completely different stories without any sense of connection. Is not until the end when the whole thing connects but it feels forced somehow.
Lastly, I didn't enjoy the fact that what happened in after crossing was hinted one too many times, but it was never developed. It's like it was supposed to be a mystery, but too much of it was disclosed but, then, it wasn't enough to understand the whole point of the plot either.
I would have loved to know more about the technology, what happened in the other side, the aftermath in time, or just some other kind of conclusion to the story.
However, this story seems to be all over the place and the pace it's too slow for it to be captivating. The world building is also not the best, at least after the first group of characters is presented.
Moving from one storyline to another, the book feels like if it's telling lots of completely different stories without any sense of connection. Is not until the end when the whole thing connects but it feels forced somehow.
Lastly, I didn't enjoy the fact that what happened in after crossing was hinted one too many times, but it was never developed. It's like it was supposed to be a mystery, but too much of it was disclosed but, then, it wasn't enough to understand the whole point of the plot either.
I would have loved to know more about the technology, what happened in the other side, the aftermath in time, or just some other kind of conclusion to the story.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 28, 2021
Based on many other reviews this book is a love or hate deal for most people.
While I wasn't on the hate spectrum I can't say I enjoyed it.
The premise was amazing...and then....nothing happened....
literally. Nothing.
Throughout the entire book.
It was a post apocalyptic type deal where the survivors had zero personality, zero growth and zero will or want to do anyting except dwell on their sad, yet also sadly uneventful pasts.
And they didn't move past those pasts. Frankly, they didn't move at all. Emotionally or physically.
The female protagonist thought about leaving Toronto for the entire book but was...well...mostly just too stagnant to?
Some people found great psychological depth in this novel.
Whatever and wherever that depth was, I missed it.
Sorry, not for me.
While I wasn't on the hate spectrum I can't say I enjoyed it.
The premise was amazing...and then....nothing happened....
literally. Nothing.
Throughout the entire book.
It was a post apocalyptic type deal where the survivors had zero personality, zero growth and zero will or want to do anyting except dwell on their sad, yet also sadly uneventful pasts.
And they didn't move past those pasts. Frankly, they didn't move at all. Emotionally or physically.
The female protagonist thought about leaving Toronto for the entire book but was...well...mostly just too stagnant to?
Some people found great psychological depth in this novel.
Whatever and wherever that depth was, I missed it.
Sorry, not for me.
August 26, 2019
Officially the worst book I have ever read. Wowowow. Nothing about it is redeeming. The only reason I finished it was the absolute disbelief that a book could be written, read and published without a single ounce of plot, character development or writing skill.
July 7, 2018
Good writing, but maybe for a younger reader. Younger than 75.
November 21, 2024
So much potential, so boring.
I wanted to like this novel set in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Unfortunately, it was not to be.
I wanted to like this novel set in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Unfortunately, it was not to be.
May 1, 2018
I received a finished copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review -- Thank you Penguin Random House!!
I was SO insanely excited for this book when I saw the possibility of getting a copy for review. I'm a massive science fiction nerd and when I read the synopsis for this book, I was SUPER excited. Not only that, but it takes place in Canada, in Southern Ontario, which is where I'm from! Nothing is cooler than going into a book and when the characters talk about streets and roads and being able to picture them perfectly because you have been to the city multiple times (it takes place in Hamilton!). So that made me have really high expectations, and although I enjoyed the book, it did have some flaws in my opinion.
The Amateurs takes place in the not so far future, and makes the reader contemplate what every character in the book contemplates - if you could go anywhere, any time, where would you go? and, WOULD you go? This book really makes the reader question their beliefs and their values, and that is really refreshing in a science fiction book.
I really enjoyed a lot of the aspects of the story. I loved the setting of the story because I was so easily able to connect with it, because I've been to Hamilton. I loved the way that the author was so descriptive of the buildings and the escarpment, how even little details were very well described, which made it really easy to picture.
I also really enjoyed how the author made some outlandish ideas seem just commonplace. All the tech, PINAphones and other tech devices, were spoken of as though they exist in the real world and we should know exactly what they are. The only qualm I had about this is I wish that she had described them a little better - there were some things I was a little confused about, and other things that my nerdy self wanted a bit more detail of.
I also enjoyed the characters themselves. There were not too many in the story, so it was very easy to keep them all straight and to remember which ones are which. I loved how they all fought and bickered and communicated, but were still families and still were able to work together.
The only problem that I had with the characters were that they didn't seem to develop a drastic amount. I found that only the main male and the main female character developed in any truly noticeable way, and even then, it was really only one major decision by either of them that showed any true development. I wish there had been a bit more from them; I feel like the story could have gone in so many more directions if there had been more monumental moments and decisions from the two main characters.
The plot itself I enjoyed, and the idea of the story itself I absolutely loved. I just wish that there had been more of the time during which the ports were being created and going around the world, when the population had been drastically dropping. The book itself takes place completely after the world's population has been demolished by the ports, and I feel like if there had been more talk and more flashbacks of the time during the ports that more could have happened in the book itself.
Overall, I thought that the book was dark, but enlightening, and that it was bold and one of the most creative books that I have read in a long time!
Overall - ★★★★☆
I was SO insanely excited for this book when I saw the possibility of getting a copy for review. I'm a massive science fiction nerd and when I read the synopsis for this book, I was SUPER excited. Not only that, but it takes place in Canada, in Southern Ontario, which is where I'm from! Nothing is cooler than going into a book and when the characters talk about streets and roads and being able to picture them perfectly because you have been to the city multiple times (it takes place in Hamilton!). So that made me have really high expectations, and although I enjoyed the book, it did have some flaws in my opinion.
The Amateurs takes place in the not so far future, and makes the reader contemplate what every character in the book contemplates - if you could go anywhere, any time, where would you go? and, WOULD you go? This book really makes the reader question their beliefs and their values, and that is really refreshing in a science fiction book.
I really enjoyed a lot of the aspects of the story. I loved the setting of the story because I was so easily able to connect with it, because I've been to Hamilton. I loved the way that the author was so descriptive of the buildings and the escarpment, how even little details were very well described, which made it really easy to picture.
I also really enjoyed how the author made some outlandish ideas seem just commonplace. All the tech, PINAphones and other tech devices, were spoken of as though they exist in the real world and we should know exactly what they are. The only qualm I had about this is I wish that she had described them a little better - there were some things I was a little confused about, and other things that my nerdy self wanted a bit more detail of.
I also enjoyed the characters themselves. There were not too many in the story, so it was very easy to keep them all straight and to remember which ones are which. I loved how they all fought and bickered and communicated, but were still families and still were able to work together.
The only problem that I had with the characters were that they didn't seem to develop a drastic amount. I found that only the main male and the main female character developed in any truly noticeable way, and even then, it was really only one major decision by either of them that showed any true development. I wish there had been a bit more from them; I feel like the story could have gone in so many more directions if there had been more monumental moments and decisions from the two main characters.
The plot itself I enjoyed, and the idea of the story itself I absolutely loved. I just wish that there had been more of the time during which the ports were being created and going around the world, when the population had been drastically dropping. The book itself takes place completely after the world's population has been demolished by the ports, and I feel like if there had been more talk and more flashbacks of the time during the ports that more could have happened in the book itself.
Overall, I thought that the book was dark, but enlightening, and that it was bold and one of the most creative books that I have read in a long time!
Overall - ★★★★☆
February 23, 2019
“People had always been stupid and full of hope, thought Marie. Despite their cynicism, everyone believed in magic.”
The ports have taken everyone away. The city’s last 42 people gather in an Anglican church. Marie. Rosa. Steve. Mo. They have nothing in common except the fact that they are here. They have resisted the ports’ siren call — “We will take you to wherever and whenever you desire.” And now they sit in the pews, eating a magenta-coloured stew that tastes of hot sauce. Marie waits for the day her ex-husband will come back to her. She waits, although no one has ever come back.
South of the border — or what would have been a border before six billion people left — Brandon sits in a meeting at PINA headquarters. He has been PINA’s marketing head since before its CEO, Albrecht Doors, harnessed the ports. Now there are only a thousand of them left at headquarters. The city is deserted. And he listens to Doors, wondering how to market to a population that has disappeared.
The Amateurs sounds like it should be a thrilling sci-fi saga of those the apocalypse left behind. Instead, it is a slow-moving story about the pull of desire. There are many pages where nothing happens. There are ample discussions about philosophy. There is slow, sad, useless yearning.
It’s poetic, I suppose, in that it is pretentious, unnecessarily padded and full of pretty quotes that don’t really mean anything.
And yet.
There is something real about The Amateurs.
Hidden underneath its veneer of unconvincing philosophy and ideas that go nowhere, there is something that clicks. And I can’t tell you what it is. Maybe it’s the idea of unbridled desire that decimates a willing population. Maybe it’s the conflict between destruction and growth, the baseball bat with which Rosa smashes windows. Maybe it’s the way Brandon falls in love with even the slightest hint of possibility.
Whatever it is, it forced me to finish the book. The ending is predictable and the philosophical epilogue is trite. But it stays with you.
I don’t have an explanation for the way I feel about The Amateurs. The characters are boring, despite (because of?) Liz Harmer’s attempt to make them deep and philosophical. The story is slow and confusing, skipping at random from past to present to future. None of the themes or philosophy are in any way original. It is an excruciatingly mediocre book.
But I enjoyed it. Sue me.
Buried deep underneath the layers of philosophy is something essential. It hints at the ache of desire that keeps us up at night. It touches on hope and despair and everything in between. Liz Harmer, you got something right. And I don’t have a clue what it is.
When I figure out why I liked this book, I will let you know. Until then, you might just have to read it yourself.
The ports have taken everyone away. The city’s last 42 people gather in an Anglican church. Marie. Rosa. Steve. Mo. They have nothing in common except the fact that they are here. They have resisted the ports’ siren call — “We will take you to wherever and whenever you desire.” And now they sit in the pews, eating a magenta-coloured stew that tastes of hot sauce. Marie waits for the day her ex-husband will come back to her. She waits, although no one has ever come back.
South of the border — or what would have been a border before six billion people left — Brandon sits in a meeting at PINA headquarters. He has been PINA’s marketing head since before its CEO, Albrecht Doors, harnessed the ports. Now there are only a thousand of them left at headquarters. The city is deserted. And he listens to Doors, wondering how to market to a population that has disappeared.
The Amateurs sounds like it should be a thrilling sci-fi saga of those the apocalypse left behind. Instead, it is a slow-moving story about the pull of desire. There are many pages where nothing happens. There are ample discussions about philosophy. There is slow, sad, useless yearning.
It’s poetic, I suppose, in that it is pretentious, unnecessarily padded and full of pretty quotes that don’t really mean anything.
And yet.
There is something real about The Amateurs.
Hidden underneath its veneer of unconvincing philosophy and ideas that go nowhere, there is something that clicks. And I can’t tell you what it is. Maybe it’s the idea of unbridled desire that decimates a willing population. Maybe it’s the conflict between destruction and growth, the baseball bat with which Rosa smashes windows. Maybe it’s the way Brandon falls in love with even the slightest hint of possibility.
Whatever it is, it forced me to finish the book. The ending is predictable and the philosophical epilogue is trite. But it stays with you.
I don’t have an explanation for the way I feel about The Amateurs. The characters are boring, despite (because of?) Liz Harmer’s attempt to make them deep and philosophical. The story is slow and confusing, skipping at random from past to present to future. None of the themes or philosophy are in any way original. It is an excruciatingly mediocre book.
But I enjoyed it. Sue me.
Buried deep underneath the layers of philosophy is something essential. It hints at the ache of desire that keeps us up at night. It touches on hope and despair and everything in between. Liz Harmer, you got something right. And I don’t have a clue what it is.
When I figure out why I liked this book, I will let you know. Until then, you might just have to read it yourself.
July 19, 2021
A post-apocalyptic tale with an strong existential air. In contrast with other end-of-the-world motifs, this work shows the boring, introspective side of the demise of civilization.
p. 314:
For Marie, it had not taken long to become accustomed to loneliness, and she perceived her life as a parabola hanging low on a graph. First she had everything--art, Jason, the possibility of children--and then she lost these things one by one. She had been pared down, thinned and thinner, until she had only herself, lonesome, in the apartment. You go used to things by degrees. Soon it was winter and the people were leaving you town completely, and you came to know that you hadn't been alone, not really, and it was possible for your hollow life to keep hollowing. There had been other lives, a million, a billion, seven billion other lives, burning flames of want and need, of anger and sorrow of memories and futures. But then you found them on the streets, and you knew what they'd been through, and you went to the church together, because some guy you recognized from the fourth floor at the library, a guy who had only ever been rude to you, had decided that people needed, if not worship, someplace to feel the strange sanctity of their lives. The church was a place to know that things were mysterious, and weird, and that people might feel, if not significant, the ghost of that significance.[end of excerpt]
The fact that it's technology (not war, disease, or pestilence) that decimates civilization makes this scenario chilling, given how dependent on and addicted we've become to the internet, GPS systems, smartphones, etc for virtually every aspect of modern life. Build tech into Malthusian theory?
Not just tech, but sophisticated, sentient, multiverse intelligence.
p. 283:
"The ports?" he said. "They seem to have figured out how to manipulate people. I think its the only explanation when you think of it for why port was so successful. They recalibrate for the desires of each person, and I think they're getting better at it. Like a--well, it's like they absorb information..."[end of excerpt]
Anyone who has seen a post about a food or product or other item pop up in their news feed moments after they were thinking about that food or product or item (not even verbalizing it, just thinking about it) can identify with that.
p. 314:
For Marie, it had not taken long to become accustomed to loneliness, and she perceived her life as a parabola hanging low on a graph. First she had everything--art, Jason, the possibility of children--and then she lost these things one by one. She had been pared down, thinned and thinner, until she had only herself, lonesome, in the apartment. You go used to things by degrees. Soon it was winter and the people were leaving you town completely, and you came to know that you hadn't been alone, not really, and it was possible for your hollow life to keep hollowing. There had been other lives, a million, a billion, seven billion other lives, burning flames of want and need, of anger and sorrow of memories and futures. But then you found them on the streets, and you knew what they'd been through, and you went to the church together, because some guy you recognized from the fourth floor at the library, a guy who had only ever been rude to you, had decided that people needed, if not worship, someplace to feel the strange sanctity of their lives. The church was a place to know that things were mysterious, and weird, and that people might feel, if not significant, the ghost of that significance.[end of excerpt]
The fact that it's technology (not war, disease, or pestilence) that decimates civilization makes this scenario chilling, given how dependent on and addicted we've become to the internet, GPS systems, smartphones, etc for virtually every aspect of modern life. Build tech into Malthusian theory?
Not just tech, but sophisticated, sentient, multiverse intelligence.
p. 283:
"The ports?" he said. "They seem to have figured out how to manipulate people. I think its the only explanation when you think of it for why port was so successful. They recalibrate for the desires of each person, and I think they're getting better at it. Like a--well, it's like they absorb information..."[end of excerpt]
Anyone who has seen a post about a food or product or other item pop up in their news feed moments after they were thinking about that food or product or item (not even verbalizing it, just thinking about it) can identify with that.
June 4, 2018
This clever story is in turn haunting and horrifying because there is so much that is so familiar.
The book's premise is similar to that of the TV show "The Last Man on Earth," which I love. Except that instead of most of the population disappearing from a virus, they disappear by going through a port, a tech device introduced by a company closely resembling Apple and led by a visionary similar to Steve Jobs.
It's not initially clear why so many people leave, except that the ports are so compelling that they are irresistible to nearly the entire population. The ports appeal to human nature -- people always want to be somewhere other than their current reality. The basis of the ports' appeal becomes clearer as you read the story. It's no surprise that the ultimate culprit is essentially out-of-control tech. As someone who has worked in tech for many years, I know how developers always want to work on the next new project, how products can be released with significant undetected bugs, and how there can be discrepancies between how a product works and how it is described. Since Web 2.0 we see how people always want the latest and greatest gadget without even understanding how it works. I agree with Elon Musk and others that more tech isn't necessarily better for humans or society as a whole, especially AI (artificial intelligence), and I can imagine it getting out of control. That's really what this story is about, along with how individuals deal with the loss of so many other people, who are necessary to maintain our current civilization and lifestyle.
The book's premise is similar to that of the TV show "The Last Man on Earth," which I love. Except that instead of most of the population disappearing from a virus, they disappear by going through a port, a tech device introduced by a company closely resembling Apple and led by a visionary similar to Steve Jobs.
It's not initially clear why so many people leave, except that the ports are so compelling that they are irresistible to nearly the entire population. The ports appeal to human nature -- people always want to be somewhere other than their current reality. The basis of the ports' appeal becomes clearer as you read the story. It's no surprise that the ultimate culprit is essentially out-of-control tech. As someone who has worked in tech for many years, I know how developers always want to work on the next new project, how products can be released with significant undetected bugs, and how there can be discrepancies between how a product works and how it is described. Since Web 2.0 we see how people always want the latest and greatest gadget without even understanding how it works. I agree with Elon Musk and others that more tech isn't necessarily better for humans or society as a whole, especially AI (artificial intelligence), and I can imagine it getting out of control. That's really what this story is about, along with how individuals deal with the loss of so many other people, who are necessary to maintain our current civilization and lifestyle.
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