Supercute Futures

by Martin Millar

'Undeniably brilliant' - Guardian

'The funniest writer in Britain today' - GQ

'A Hello Kitty-type brand dominating the global economy and bringing governments to heel feels chillingly plausible' Herald Scotland

Mox and Mitsu are Supercute. They founded the global business Supercute Enterprises as teenagers, armed only with a phone, a collection of their favourite cuddly toys and a love of all things kawaii . Thanks to them, the Supercute aesthetic is now a way of life.

In a world dominated by massive conglomerates, Supercute has continued to grow bigger and more powerful, morphing from an entertainment company to a ruthless organisation fighting for their right to the world's water.

Now Mox and Mitsu face a choice. In a world that is tearing itself apart, who will win in the battle for ultimate control - and where will Supercute draw the line . . .

Readers LOVE Martin

'A bit like falling into Bladerunner via a manga cartoon. Like everything by Martin Millar it's both funny and sad.' Amazon review, verified purchase

'One of the funniest books ever written' Amazon review, verified purchase

'Oh my goodness, how I WISH it were real! Amazing, easy to read piece of fiction which will stay with me for a long time ' Twitter user

'Superb, hilarious, heartwarming, brilliant. A work of genius' Amazon review, verified purchase

' I strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in Cyberpunk ' Goodreads review

'Sex, drugs and anarchy reign - definitely not your average fairy tale! ' Amazon review, verified purchase

' A very British strain of understated comedy . . . a finely honed sense of absurdist whims . . . delightful ' Amazon review, verified purchase

' As always, Millar aligns himself with life's eccentrics, misfits and innocents in the struggle against politicians, military leaders, financiers and other idiots' Amazon review, verified purchase

'Had me laughing out loud on the tube' Amazon review, verified purchase

'Five Star Fab! Buy it, borrow it, steal it - but DO read it' Twitter user

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Humor, Dystopia

240 pages, Paperback

First published August 30, 2018

About the author

Martin Millar is a critically acclaimed Scottish writer from Glasgow, now resident in London. He also writes the Thraxas series of fantasy novels under the pseudonym Martin Scott.

The novels he writes as Martin Millar dwell on urban decay and British sub-cultures, and the impact this has on a range of characters, both realistic and supernatural. There are elements of magical realism, and the feeling that the boundary between real life and the supernatural is not very thick. Most of them are set in Brixton, Millar's one-time place of residence. Many are at least semi-autobiographical, and Love and Peace with Melody Paradise and Suzy, Led Zeppelin and Me both feature Millar himself as a character.

As Martin Scott his Thraxas novels are a fusion of traditional high fantasy and pulp noir thrillers.

In 2000, he won the World Fantasy Award for best novel for Thraxas.

Reviews

[Nicholas Smeaton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have long regarded Cyberpunk as a sub-genre that had done it's dash but this book shows that there is still plenty of life in Cyberpunk still, all that was needed was a fresh approach and here the author has done it with a two pronged approach; first the story is about people at the top of the pile instead of the bottom and as the story progresses it becomes clear that they are in their own way slaves to the system as much as everyone else, the second is that he's created a setting I'll call Fluffypunk - outwardly cute and inviting but underneath it's as grim and nasty as any traditional Cyberpunk setting and with all the traditional cyberpunk tropes; body augmentation, virtual and augmented reality, extraterritorial corporations, massive social divides. The story revolves around the Mitsu and Mox founders of the Mega corporation Supercute a Media conglomerate with divisions in desalination (Necessary in a world ravaged by natural disasters) and weapons technology, when a rival corporation tries to steal their corporation out from under them via some hacking they're forced to recruit some highly unlikely allies in order to fight back. Things I particularly liked about this book were the moral ambiguity of most of the characters, you have good people doing bad things to advance their worthy cause because that's the only way to achieve their goals and the setting of a world that's been ravaged by natural disasters (It's never spelt out exactly what happened as that would have derailed the flow of the narrative but it appears the Earth was hit by multiple asteroids which triggered earthquakes, tsunami and volcanic eruptions including the Yellowstone super volcano). The author managers to include some black humour and astute observations about the nature of capitalism and society but again not at the expense of the narrative. If I have one criticism it's that the book is a little light on descriptions of characters and locations, it doesn't need to be pages of detailed description but a few more adjectives would have been nice. I strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in Cyberpunk as it acts as a good entry point to new readers and a refreshing change in perspective to hardcore fans.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked 'Supercute Futures' off my local library's sci-fi shelf as it looked potentially intriguing. The narrative centres on Mox and Mitsu, lifelong friends and business partners who own and run a vast multinational conglomerate called Supercute Enterprises. They began as social media influencers and fifty-ish years later in a grim future of environmental disaster sell entertainment, weapons, and desalinisation plants with kawaii branding. Although they are from London, there is too little of Japan left for cultural appropriation to be of any concern. The action-packed plot follows an attempt to oust Mitsu and Mox from their company. These hypercapitalist versus hypercapitalist stakes were not enough to create much suspense for me. I felt no sense of peril and all of the frequent violence seemed distant.

Indeed, the book's whole tone was rather offhand. While it contained some interesting ideas and many neat concepts, none of them were developed in any great depth. Mox and Mitsu could have been such fascinating characters and I wanted further insight into them. The reader listens into brief snippets of their discussions with an AI therapist, yet they remain largely mysterious. Other characters verge upon caricatures, notably the alcoholic private eye with a military past. The most vivid and detailed aspects of the book are Supercute's products and branding, which I should perhaps have expected from the title. There are some reflections upon the amoral destructiveness of gigantic businesses, yet they are also too abbreviated and superficial to become genuinely satirical. I enjoyed most of the one-liners and all of the outfit details, while hoping for more developed protagonists, considered critique of capitalism, or ideally both. 'Supercute Futures' prioritised zany action sequences instead.

[Tania · Rating 4 out of 5]

So much fun.

Mox and Mitsu were two child prodigies with a love of all things cute, Kawaii and Japanese. They started the Supercute Show on YouTube with their Iphones. While the world fell apart, with impacts, nuclear wars and other disasters, their popularity grew and they branched out getting into Desalination just as the world runs out of fresh water. Now they are one of the world's top conglomerates. More powerful than most governments and others want to destroy their empire.
They now have to battle back into their fortress, battling modified soldiers and attack drones, while backing sure their face paint and lipstick remains intact. Fortunately they have their body modifications to help, as well as some young Supercute fans in their virtual reality spaces.

[Kayla · Rating 1 out of 5]

Supercute Futures having an average rating of 3.5 absolutely baffles me. It's bad, y'all. It's really bad. It's not well written. The dialogue is awkward. The characters are as two-dimensional as cardboard cutouts. Somehow aspects of the setting remain unclear even with the massive amount of infodumping - which, by the by, is still there at page 122, more than halfway through the book.

Now you might say, "But Kayla, you didn't even finish the book! Maybe it gets better." I did have a long hard think where I considered just finishing it. I got to page 122. I'm already halfway, so I might as well see it through to the end. But then I remembered I read books for fun, and this book made me mad. Writing-in-the-margins-and-sending-voice-notes-to-friends kind of mad. So no, I won't be finishing it. What I read was already more than enough.

First, the good. The setting... sure was cyberpunk.

Now for the bad. The two main characters, Mox and Mitsu, are clearly supposed to be some kind of feminist icons. Don't be fooled: they're just a white man in disguise (Yes, one. They don't have individual personalities). In one of her therapy sessions (which are just a lazy way of providing exposition), Mox mentions that they "supported women's rights all over the world". Even though Supercute Futures spells a lot of things out so much that Millar might as well be holding your dick while you pee, this is never expanded upon. What is then expanded upon is how the Supercute founders rose to popularity: through bashing public figures and racism. I'm not kidding. They mocked minorities "just to annoy people". I have to deal with white men on the internet already. I don't want to deal with them in books, too.

I mentioned before the writing is awkward. Millar makes a valiant effort to do some of his infodumping through dialogue, which just results the same information essentially being repeated twice. I'd like to be generous and blame his awkward dialogue on this, but all the dialogue is awkward. Anybody who's had one real life conversation can see that this is not how people actually talk.

Supposedly there's some strong anti-capitalist messages throughout the book. It just seems to boil down to 'capitalism ruins people's lives sometimes :('. Extremely sharp criticism, there. I'll admit there's something baked into the idea of big corporations essentially ruling the world, but that's just piggybacking off the cyberpunk genre. It's lazy. Same can be said for some other discussions Miller tries to have. He mentions the question of whether or not you're still human if you've had all your body parts replaced, which might have been interesting, if he didn't just frame it as a popular discussion. Yeah, its a discussion people have been having, you're familiar with it, you do the rest.

Also, there's kind of AI pedophilia? The bodies involved are both adult, but one of them was "too recently made to have lived", which is just... She's basically a toddler. It's weird.

[Carmen Austin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This Book Is For Martin Millar SuperSuperFans Everywhere

I was rooting for Mox and Mitsu the whole time, but should I have been? Martin Millar does it again with his lovable, but f****d up characters.

[Martin Willoughby · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wish I had the hardback version. It would burn longer.

[Carolyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightfully silly, bonkers sci-fi that doesn't take itself too seriously but with some real bite beneath the cute, and humour as black as treacle beneath all the pastels and rainbow. It can be difficult to decide whether Mox and Mitsu are emotionally stunted due to the trauma and tragedy in their lives or are just calculating (maybe borderline sociopathic) women-children but either way they're supremely entertaining, leading to plenty of moments of inappropriate hilarity as well as moments of "oh-my-god-I'm-not-sure-I-saw-that-one-coming". You don't have to be conversant with the tropes of anime and manga but if you are it adds another layer of subtext that makes everything twice as funny. (Plus the book-cover is gorgeous & I want it as a poster:D)

[Bek Macee · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is quite like manga in the form of a novel. I'm a manga fan and I really enjoyed it. I liked the kawaii elements in the Supercute Empire and I also liked that it's not mocked in the book. The nature of kawaii is not made to look ridiculous, and nor are its followers. The joint heroines, Mox and Mitsu, are presented as frivolous in public, but efficient and even deadly behind the scenes. As a cyberpunk adventure, the story moves along swiftly. It seems light but there are some notably darker elements below the surface. Overall I thought the book was cleverly constructed and made for an intelligent story, giving a rather unusual take on the dystopian future it portrays.

[Kazima · Rating 3 out of 5]

Supercute, Superfun and surprisingly Superdark at times. A fun little read!

[David Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm grateful to the publisher for a review copy of this book.

In a near future where the earth has been blighted by a series of disasters - human caused and natural - corporate culture dominates, with the top 19 conglomerates - the "C19" - at the top of the pile. Among these is Supercute, the empire founded by teenagers Mox and Mitsu in their bedroom, using an iPhone to create their own show which would feature not only fashion and music but maths, science and philosophy.

But that was decades ago. While Mox and Mitsu still present their show they're now at the head of an enterprise that not only provides clean water to near starving population, but makes arms. That doesn't just project an image of CGI "cuteness" but builds over nature reserves. That has virtually dropped its educational mission, and even has reserves of troops.

And the Supercute girls are barely human, having received augmentation after augmentation.

This was a grim view of the future indeed, and yet - in the obsession with marketing, glamour and image - rather plausible. In particular I found it didn't take a lot of imagination to accept the enfeebled governments, impoverished public realm and corporate chicanery. The latter is a key ingredient of the book, as a rival corporation, led by the ridiculous Moe Bennie, essentially hacks into Supercute to stage a hostile takeover. "Hostile", in the work, meaning something ultimately enforced by private armies, drones and missiles. Mox and Mitsu are challenged as never before by this, thrown onto the ropes and having to fight back for everything they've built.

That makes for a story which is essentially one drawn out chase and revenge sequence, mainly taking part in the abandoned, radioactive tunnels of the London Underground and in the various virtual "spaces" where Supercute and the other corporations hang out. The girls have to recruit some VERY disgruntled ex employees to help them, as well as some of the legion of Supercute Superfans around the world.

This was where the story got a bit squirmy for me, as I didn't really get the motivation of the ex-employees - Mox and Mitsu aren't, and don't really try to be, very persuasive to those who already have reason to distrust them - and the idea of billionaires recruiting help from the impoverished teenage girls living in refugee camps who seem to be Supercute's key demographic isn't really a very nice one. But I think that's possibly the point. When I first started reading the book I felt that M&M (sorry, I can't help that) were a bland and characterless pair, but I think what the book reveals is that's just a (cute) front. Underneath - and once out of the studio - they have bags of character, it's just they're not very nice at all.

Indeed, if you knew at the start what you learn by the end, you probably wouldn't care at all what became of them. The Supercute empire, which started with a commitment to real good - relief of suffering, empowerment, an educational purpose - has become nothing more than part of the corporatist apparat keeping the struggling masses down. Despite the intermittent attempt of the girls or of others to excuse themselves, it's clear there's been no real attempt to stand against this and I fairly quickly began to ask why should I care about them at all. But by then a VERY hectic chase was under way with it's own momentum.

The other difficulty I had with the story was the unlikely sequence of disasters which seemed to have befallen Earth to make everyone so miserable. Apart from understable things like global warming, and wars, we hear of a dramatic collapse in the ozone layer, numerous volcanic eruptions and tsunamis, accidents involving nuclear waste which have left much of the Thames Estuary irradiated and even a supernova. There is also talk of several "impacts" which I took to be meteorites or the like. I was waiting for some kind of rationalisation of this - have Supercute and the other corporations taken advantage of all these calamities, or did they somehow cause them? It seems too much, and too varied, for coincidence, and actually I think the global prognosis from what we already know is grim enough to motivate this future without the need for extra disasters.

So I do have some reservations. (I was also rather gobsmacked by the ending - Millar delivers a truly "WTF happened there?" moment which will I think annoy those who think they're going to get a neat, clear conclusion. But I don't mind that, though I am still puzzled. I won't spoiler by saying what I think the ending meant, but if anyone out there has any ideas, I'd be happy to discuss).

That said, though, it's not a bad read, it has terrific pace, it is short (I can imagine some authors making this two or three times as long, which wouldn't work at all) and, in its own terms, plausible.

[Alicia Gadi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know where to start. I really liked it because I didn't expect this kind of cute cyberpunk, but I didn't find it 'funny' as people say. I'd rather consider it a very experimental novel that looks into further elements of science fiction.

[Jack Deighton · Rating 2 out of 5]

Welcome to the realm of Mox and Mitsu, stars of the Supercute Show, the world’s most popular entertainment. Starting as teenage girls in a bedroom in London with only an iPhone and a collection of cuddly toys, using their own skills, software assistance and enhanced bodies - only thirty percent of their brains is still organic, about the only original body parts left - they have parlayed their following into the mammoth Supercute Enterprises, one of the world’s top nineteen conglomerates, with fingers in every pie (including weapons production) but particularly desalination. Their trade-marks are multi – but never clashing – colours, always having twelve centimetres of skin showing between their skirts/shorts and stockings (they are not unaware of older male followers) and Big Colour Super V-hair. Not color, note. Mox insists. Civilisation may be having a difficult time but it’s not yet ended. The Supercute Show can be accessed via what reads like “normal” television but also through Supercute space, in effect a virtual reality zone, a kaleidoscopic cyberspace, entry to which is mediated through purchases and brand enthusiasm.
The outside world is in the wake of an unspecified set of disasters alluded to but not described in the text. Large areas lie derelict and deserted at best, irradiated at worst, with government regulation of the C19 virtually non-existent and its members subject to fierce competition. “‘When you get to a certain size you can’t stop.’” Investors want growth. If you stand still you get swallowed up. Hence Mox and Mitsu are there to be shot at.
Enter Moe Bennie at Lark 3 Media with his offer to Supercute’s desalination rivals RK Enviro. He plans to exploit a flaw in Mox’s and Mitsu’s android Artificial Intelligence Forecast Unit, Aifu, to gain control of the company’s shares and consign Mox and Mitsu to oblivion. Literally. Members of the C19 deploy lethal force vigorously to protect their interests. Premises are guarded by “ag-scans” which detect hostile intent.
It does then seem a little odd that Millar puts into Bennie’s mouth the thought, “‘Most people don’t care about the super-rich. They’re struggling through life, worrying how they’re going to pay the rent while politicians tell them it’s time to make sacrifices. Meanwhile some guy on a yacht had just made 100 million with his AI investment software. The same day my first hedge fund reached ten billion, the government cut child benefit in half.’” The text offers no other trace of conscience on his part. Rather the opposite.
Not that Mox and Mitsu are innocent themselves. As things progress we learn more about how their success was achieved, how much potentially reputation damaging information they have suppressed. Their rise was in part propelled by confrontationalism, until their edge was blunted by the necessity to placate advertisers, their educational intent watered down so as not to baffle consumers unduly. Happy Little Science Pixie, anyone? In this, Millar’s dystopia is depressingly familiar.
Bennie’s strategy begins to succeed and the Supercute Show falls off air but he has reckoned without Mox and Mitsu’s determination and their devoted followers. Two of these, Amowie in Igboland and Raquel in South America, all but pre-teenagers, are the most engaging and (a little conveniently?) resourceful characters in the book.
The final confrontation - in shoot-em-up style - is enabled by a pair of time-limited Mox and Mitsu clones quickly computer-printed in a back-street laboratory.
The comparison to Vonnegut which is blazoned on the back cover is to my mind totally misplaced and does Millar no favours. There is a certain tonal similarity but in matters of execution Millar falls way behind, especially as regards information dumping. It is obtrusive enough elsewhere but it sometimes appears that the only purpose of a Mox and Mitsu conversation is so that a piece of background can follow immediately. Plus no matter how true it is I don’t recall a Vonnegut protagonist ever displaying cynicism of the order of, “‘As for confidence. If you don’t have enough you can fake it.... tell the world it’s lucky to have you ... after you’ve faked it for a while, you’ll start to believe it.’” He was more for the underdog.
Supercute Futures isn’t high art nor a rigorous exposure of corporate (lack of) ethics. It’s a bit too broad brush for that and its intention different. But if you don’t take it too seriously, it’s a pleasant enough ride.

[Jay · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked up Supercute Futures on the premise of a dystopia where an entertainment company that co-opts popular Japanese subcultures could also be in involved in water purification and weapons development, which I thought was a fascinating set up. There's some of that here, in somewhat bulky chunks of exposition and clunky dialogue where people tell others things they both already know about the world, but for the most part this book is actually about the abrupt hostile takeover of the aformentioned company by another kawaii obsessed millionaire entertainer near indistinguishable from the protagonists.

It's slightly odd to see a cult of personality developed around two characters so utterly devoid of it, but that is exactly what Supercute Enterprises is. Mox and Mitsu are interchangable personality vacuums, to the extent of functioning as one person in two bodies for narrative purposes. Attempts to differentiate them are paltry and insufficient. They're entertaining to watch to an extent, much like their show within the story, but there is little else to them. Even when the cutesy exterior slips and you get a grim glimpse at what's underneath, it does nothing to differentiate them. They could be one person without losing anything. One nasty, soulless person.

The rest of the cast are a cliche assortment: the robot assistant, the bitter disgraced doctor, the PI with a drinking problem, the eager wide eyed fan, the ultra convenient hacker; all somewhat enjoyable but lacking the development to make them real and not just archtypes. There's a lot of action, lots to do and little time before the takeover is complete so things happen fast. There are moments of true potential that might have had a chance in a longer book, but they're part of the swift parade of interesting notes that come and go in the background of a story about infighting amongst terrible rich people. Zuckerberg vs Bezos. No good option.

It's a fun ride but it lacks depth, and while that partially seems to be the point, there's something missing in the execution. Self aware but not really sentient.

[Jack Bates · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know I've said this before, but I really love the way Millar writes. It's deceptively simple in a very particular way. I like the way he writes about clothes as well - there are lots of descriptions of outfits in this because Mox and Mitsu think a lot about their clothes, which are a big part of the Supercute brand.

I don't know how you'd describe this book exactly, I guess it's a sci-fi thriller in many ways. Cyberpunk? I suppose so.

Mox and Mitsu, the Supercute 'girls' (I think they're in their sixties maybe, but various enhancements (they're only about 4% human these days) mean they retain their youthful looks as well as being very strong. They live in a post-multiple-apocalypse London, and run an immense 'entertainment plus' business. They make TV and video games and own de-salination plants (essential in the very damaged world of the late 21st century) and are involved, more awkwardly, in various weapons companies. When Moe Bennie attempts to take over Supercute and destroy everything they've created, they fight back, aided mostly by their extremely uncompromising natures. Supercute might be cute - that's the whole point obviously - but their military grade enhancements and ruthlessness are - less cute. This is a fun 'save the world' (or at least, save Mox and Mitsu's world) romp with a lot of interesting things to say about, well, capitalism I guess.

[Tove · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am so confused 😭

This book follows two Babymetal-esque girls who have ship-of-theseus-ed themselves into 94% robots with biomechanics, and are the faces of the biggest MovieStarPlanet-gone-Sword-Art-Online online space on the planet, to the point where their superstardom rules the real world too. Suddenly, their biggest rival manages to take over their company, and Mox and Mitsu are cast out. The two spend the rest of the book trying to break back into their offices and take back what was rightfully theirs all along. DOESN'T IT SOUND COOL AF???

Now, this very much highlights how this book was simply Not Writter For Me, but had it been *longer*, less focused on comedy (if there was any), and even darker, this could have been a rly rly cool dystopian, futuristic take on capitalism and the question about where the line goes between human and robot. But, instead, it was too heavy on exposition through dialogue, overexplaining some thing and underexplaining others, leaving characters two dimensional and flat, and also highly confusing with its constant POV switches without any kind of indication or *chapter cuts*.

If the writing was choppy and flat and statement-like with the intention of fitting into the robot-talk, it fits confusingly well. However it makes for a very unengaging reading experience, unfortunately.

TLDR; a lot of potential missed.

[Malcolm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Martin Millar has a sharp eye for the paradoxes and contradictions of contemporary cultures, and here takes on global corporate media in tale of a corporate behemoth, conjured out of a west London bedroom by two Japanese popular culture obsessed teens – who still, many body rebuilds later, still run the global business. But global media domination is hard to maintain Supercute is subject to a hostile take-over – leading Mox and Mitsu into an equally hostile recovery.

It’s an entertaining satire on the corporate state, with private police and security forces defending corporate owned lands, and never mind the rest…. But Millar is at his best when his stories are smaller and humane, often with a marginal type who doesn’t quite fit: this is missing from this parody of corporate power struggles. It remains delightfully entertaining, but it lacks the pathos that makes his best work sparkle.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is probably Millar's most accessible book and his first foray into a post-apocalyptic world which might put off longtime fans. However, the beating heart of Millar's work is his ability to make ordinary and unlikable characters likeable. As you read his works, amoral actions are explained and flawed characters are developed until you understand motivations and are able to empathize with the protagonists.

Just as important are Millar's quirky sense of humor and his unique take on familiar tropes. Millar's worlds are carefully constructed to be unfamiliar and a little unsettling. In Supercute Futures, Millar's post-apocalyptic word is as unique as his vision of New York or Scotland. Millar enjoys subverting expectations. This maybe jarring if you are looking for a "comfort" read, but if you want something new and quirky, Millar's post-apocalyptic London is the place to be.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have been really excited to read this since I love Martin Miller's book, 'The Good Fairies of New York'. 'Supercute Futures' is a great satire that is both adorable and terrifying. Reading it was fun because if you are familiar with kawaii style, the imagery is hilarious. This is the most colorful dystopian novel I've ever read. Unfortunately, I thought the pacing was not great. If it wasn't such a short book, I might have really struggled finishing it. At times the story moved too fast to really let plot points and characters land, but then it spent so much time on descriptions (which admittedly, is where a lot of the humor comes from). I think you would enjoy this book if you are familiar with Japanese pop culture and really like dark future stories.

[Johanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Martin Millar has been one of my favourite authors for many years now. This book took me a little longer to get into than some (his distinctive style, which is deceptively simple and charmingly repetitive, felt a bit clunky in the opening pages), but once the action got going, I was all in. Mox and Mitsi, the manga style, clothing obsessed, scientist TV hosts, have to race against time, robots and corruption to save their own potentially corrupt empire from an arrogant nemesis. Set in a post climate change world, this book has politics, tech and fluffy bunnies. What more could you want?

[Kyrie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kawaii creatures and scifi meet up in ways only Martin Millar can create. Mox and Mitsu have created an empire of Supercute things - both in real life and the cyber world. Their business has expanded to involve water purification and other things necessary in a future world devasted by assorted events. Rivals try to outshine them, or at least buy them out on the market. It's very confusing, and weird. Fast chases through London. Cybernet battling. Overly cute cuddly creatures. Wildly colored hair. Hard to explain.

[Ry Herman · Rating 2 out of 5]

I normally quite like Martin Millar's writing, but this one didn't work for me. While there are some interesting ideas in this, I don't think his style works well for science fiction, or at least it didn't here - what normally comes across as deadpan observation turned into bald exposition in both the narrative and dialogue. When coupled with the fact that this is the story of thoroughly unlikeable people doing battle against somewhat more unlikeable people, the story ended up leaving me cold.

[Adam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Do you like cyberpunk aesthetic with a generous dollop of British humor and wit? Did you not know that that was a thing? Then do you self a favor and check out this book! Martin Millar does a fantastic job of creating a somehow realistic and somewhat bleak but also very funny and dynamic future world populated by quirky and engaging characters whose story you find yourself really wanting to follow.

[Ian Mccausland · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read! Nothing too challenging. If you read Ready Player One in like a day ( like I did!) then you’ll get a kick out of this

You could almost feel this as the screenplay. I’d be surprised if this book wasn’t optioned for movie adaption. Could be a fun ride.

Question: what movie do you think Amowie scrambled to erase?

[fran · Rating 3 out of 5]

really easy book to read to help me get out of a slump, some dark jokes which i though fell a bit flat but i loved the overall descriptions of the outfits and supercute as a brand. wished there was more descriptive writing to help create layers to each individual character as i wasn’t really in anyone’s side nor worried for anyone if they were harmed - didn’t help in terms of suspense

[Tabitha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was not expecting much from this book but it over delivered and blew me away! Cyber-punk corporate espionage with some existential ennui thrown in. It's witty, clever, fast-paced, and always has one more surprise for you right up to the end.

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

dystopian futuristic sci-fi with a great sense of humor! Sometimes i got distracted and fall asleep in the fight scenes but I also get distracted in movie fight scenes too so that is just my tendency not any fault of the book. I want to see more of these characters!

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

I looked forward to this one, and I found it fine but nothing special.

[Daniel Logan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible!

Martin Millar is my favourite author of all time. Supercute Futures is funny, creepy, sad, and crazy. Just read it.

[Bob Hanks · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kinda cyberpunky

[Pennie Malone · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not sure what I just read. I think I liked it (even loved it perhaps?) but utterly confused and bewildered. My vision is very pastel coloured now