Autonomous

Hardcover, 303 pages

English language

Published Sept. 19, 2017 by Tor Books.

ISBN:
9780765392077

View on OpenLibrary

4 stars (35 reviews)

Autonomous features a rakish female pharmaceutical pirate named Jack who traverses the world in her own submarine. A notorious anti-patent scientist who has styled herself as a Robin Hood heroine fighting to bring cheap drugs to the poor, Jack’s latest drug is leaving a trail of lethal overdoses across what used to be North America—a drug that compels people to become addicted to their work.

On Jack’s trail are an unlikely pair: an emotionally shut-down military agent and his partner, Paladin, a young military robot, who fall in love against all expectations. Autonomous alternates between the activities of Jack and her co-conspirators, and Elias and Paladin, as they all race to stop a bizarre drug epidemic that is tearing apart lives, causing trains to crash, and flooding New York City.

2 editions

Review of 'Autonomous' on 'GoodReads'

4 stars

It's very similar to most of Doctorow's novels, in both a good and a bad way; it still relies on magical 3D printers and still has this sort of legalistic monomania (though a different sort of imaginary property), but I do go for that stuff. I think the discussion on autonomy, freedom and privacy feels fresh, though I felt it really took off around 100-150 pages in or so.

There are some very solarpunk scenes as well, though I don't think you can call the book solarpunk.

Review of 'Autonomous' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

вельми добре читання (або слухання в моєму випадку — я слухав аудіокнижку, позичену онлайн в бібліотеці banq у монреалі, але то окрема історія). оповідь досліджує одразу дві великих і непростих теми: куди веде нас сучасний стан системи ліцензування та право власності на все, і «чи сняться андроїдам електричні вівці» — причому цю другу тему авторка зуміла розкрити, на мою думку, якщо не краще, то принаймні яскравіше і цікавіше для пересічного читача, без діківської претензії на місце серед класиків. підсумок: якщо подобаються літературні розвідки корі докторова про свободи і несвободи в майбутньому, напружена серія "rifters" пітера вотса, фільм "чаппі" — читати "autonomous" негайно!

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Subjects

  • Drugs--Side effects--Fiction.
  • Drugs--Fiction.
  • Robots--Fiction.
  • Scientists--Fiction.
  • Smugglers--Fiction.