ebook in german
Published 2018 by Heyne Verlag.
I mean, what a great ride. It's hilarious, serious, sad, existential-crisising (that's a word, right?), and so much more. For a book which spends so much time questioning the meaning of humanity and life, it's truly a wonder that I have left fealing more secure in my belief that we are alive than anything else.
Can't wait to read book two.
A decent premise ruined by a thoroughly irritating POV character that we end up with multiple indistinguishable copies of. There is a moment near the start where it looks like an unsympathetic character might possibly have to confront his character flaws and suffer for his hubris, but nope, Bob turns out to be the perfect Mary Sue for this post apocalyptic space exploration Isekai. The most irritating feature is the author's tendency to declare various things as universal truths when there's scant evidence presented to justify it and besides this is a work of fiction, bringing attention to it just ruins the suspension of disbelief. By far the most disgusting section is his adventures intervening in primitive civilizations where every decision is wrong and horrific but is apparently justified.
Steer clear, for tales of distributed intelligence go read the Ancillary books, for hard sci-fi tales of early stage colonization there's …
A decent premise ruined by a thoroughly irritating POV character that we end up with multiple indistinguishable copies of. There is a moment near the start where it looks like an unsympathetic character might possibly have to confront his character flaws and suffer for his hubris, but nope, Bob turns out to be the perfect Mary Sue for this post apocalyptic space exploration Isekai. The most irritating feature is the author's tendency to declare various things as universal truths when there's scant evidence presented to justify it and besides this is a work of fiction, bringing attention to it just ruins the suspension of disbelief. By far the most disgusting section is his adventures intervening in primitive civilizations where every decision is wrong and horrific but is apparently justified.
Steer clear, for tales of distributed intelligence go read the Ancillary books, for hard sci-fi tales of early stage colonization there's the Expanse, for Pop culture laden self insert ego trips there's always Homestuck.
I actually really enjoyed this one. I'd put it in the same category as something like "A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet": a quick, nice read. Nothing too challenging idea-wise, and it's not going to win any awards for innovation in the genre, but I don't regret reading it. A great book for a vacation read, I think, and the different Bobs let it sample a couple of different genres in a neat enough way.
Loved it
Ok, let's start with the good. I love me a hard scifi book and I thoroughly appreciated the effort the author took to factor in relativistic travel and communication. The humor is fantastic and definitely had me chuckling. The concept is also incredibly good and very unique, I really like the subtle differences in every Bob and enjoyed jumping around to the different story threads.
Now the bad. Why the fuck aren't there any important women? Aside from Bob's relatives the only other woman that plays any significant role is the scientist who stands in for Dr. Landis and all she's there for is for Bob to appreciate that he can still feel attraction. I mean come on! Literally none of the other replicant probes are women either! Oh, and the most annoying part for me was when Bob met a sentient stone age race and found a female of …
Ok, let's start with the good. I love me a hard scifi book and I thoroughly appreciated the effort the author took to factor in relativistic travel and communication. The humor is fantastic and definitely had me chuckling. The concept is also incredibly good and very unique, I really like the subtle differences in every Bob and enjoyed jumping around to the different story threads.
Now the bad. Why the fuck aren't there any important women? Aside from Bob's relatives the only other woman that plays any significant role is the scientist who stands in for Dr. Landis and all she's there for is for Bob to appreciate that he can still feel attraction. I mean come on! Literally none of the other replicant probes are women either! Oh, and the most annoying part for me was when Bob met a sentient stone age race and found a female of that species wielding a modified tool. I was so excited, finally a smart pioneering woman who'll help advance her species...nope! It was her son that modified it and she's only ever mentioned in passing again. In fact all of the women of the Deltans are only mentioned when they're cowering with the children when the tribe is being attacked. What the fuck is going on with this author? Maybe there'll be some interesting, strong, or smart women in one of the other books in the series but with the way this one went I fucking doubt it.
We've knocked off 99.95% of the human race, and somehow the crazies still manage to survive. It just defies the odds.
Enjoyable book that was a light read that also had a fairly deep concept to work from. What does it mean to be sentient? What prevents someone from embodying that concept? How much of yourself remains you when you're no longer your original self?
Each POV/Bob had a unique voice that made following the story easy. I found myself invested in each story arc and the book flew by. The pop culture references were light (not as heavy handed as Ready Player One) and the story wasn't burdened with explaining the science.
Onto For We Are Many.
Very enjoyable read. Lots of thorough figurative (and some literal) world-building, done by an author with both an enjoyable, sardonic sense of humor and a Project Manager's thorough approach to such things. Definitely a solid entry in the "fun reads" pile; I'll be queuing up the next one.
I don't know how to feel about this one. The humor stopped helping somewhere around the half-way point, but there were some fun moments.
The biggest issue was that much of it felt like I was listening to a first-person narration of the early Warcraft games.
Fun, lighter sci-fi that has some interesting heavy elements. Does not get too hung up in the technicalities, but feels plausible.
The narrator on Audible was fantastic and did a great Admiral Ackbar impression!
A fun, geeky sci fi adventure with some interesting theoretical science behind it. If you enjoyed books like Ready Player One, Year Zero, and Old Man's War, you'll probably love this one. Wealthy software magnate Bob signs up to have his brain cryofrozen on death in hopes of future resurrection -- but when he wakes up, he learns the US has dissolved and his brain is now property of a religeous state who has declared the deceased have no rights. Bob's intelligence has been uploaded to a self-replicating space probe with the mission to explore, multiply, and find colonizable worlds -- but he's not the only probe out there and the other countries are both trying to get theirs out first, and destroy Bob. The book follows Bob's mission and, without giving too much away, the plot takes several twists. My only complaint is that it got a little confusing …
A fun, geeky sci fi adventure with some interesting theoretical science behind it. If you enjoyed books like Ready Player One, Year Zero, and Old Man's War, you'll probably love this one. Wealthy software magnate Bob signs up to have his brain cryofrozen on death in hopes of future resurrection -- but when he wakes up, he learns the US has dissolved and his brain is now property of a religeous state who has declared the deceased have no rights. Bob's intelligence has been uploaded to a self-replicating space probe with the mission to explore, multiply, and find colonizable worlds -- but he's not the only probe out there and the other countries are both trying to get theirs out first, and destroy Bob. The book follows Bob's mission and, without giving too much away, the plot takes several twists. My only complaint is that it got a little confusing switching back and forth between all the different copies of Bob, but overall it's well handled and all the Bobs are very entertaining. Not a book that left me with great life lessons or anything, but a fun read and I'll probably pick up the sequels at some point when I need some entertaining light reading.
Lighthearted, often funny. Not terribly new ground, and didn't really wrestle with the question of what makes a person a person for as long as I would've liked. Also intro'd the idea of variation amongst the clones but didn't really explore its source or ramifications.
Easy to read book with a very likable main character. I both read and listened to this book, and the Audible narration is top notch.
A thouroughly enjoyable book! Had some LoLs in the beginning of the book. Love the nerdiness of it. My attention started to flag near the end of the book. The author lost my attention there, and at the end, I had to rewind some minutes because the ending is abrupt.
All the Bob-versions were awesome, the premise is great. Now please, keep up the good writing, as in: the good writing from the start of the book, not the boring writing of the end. Writing endings is a particular skill in writers, and not all of them are good at it (for example, Neal Stephenson really sucks at it). But it is something you can practice.
So, I'm looking forward to more Bobbiverse!
