Will Oprisko's Reviews > Robopocalypse

Stylistically, this book tries to blend the journalistic feel of "World War Z" with a traditional science fiction narrative, but fails to accomplish either one. Unfortunately, the result is an unbalanced story that focuses on describing what happened without developing how it happened and why. Unlike "World War Z", the author does not create a series of believable characters that share their experience of the war and shine light on how the robot-apocalypse uniquely affected humanity across the globe. Instead, the voice of the author overwhelms every story arc and interview, and ends up providing a simplistic account of what should have been a thought-provoking investigation of humanity and technology. Sadly, the downfall of the robots is unconvincing and there is never a sense that mankind is in any real danger and may not be able to survive as a species. There are many wonderful themes touched upon in the book (e.g. freewill and consciousness, knowledge versus information, synthetic and organic love, limitations of super-intelligence, and the self-destructive nature of sentient life), but they are superficially explored and do not provide any new insights for the reader to consider.

The quality of the writing is mediocre and nothing to brag about as a first attempt into the realm of science fiction. My favorite part of the book was the esoteric quote by Richard Brautigan in his poem "All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace" at the beginning of part five. It's definitely worth reading and looking up. Everything else is forgettable and the story itself is another example of a great idea with plenty of potential that is squandered by a lack of imagination and skillful writing.