EinFach Deutsch Unterrichtsmodelle : Dave Eggers : Der Circle

DNF at 30%. Started reading this to fulfill a prompt for a reading challenge. Granted, I was reading it 10 years after it was published, but it’s too slow, too boring, and the characters are one-dimensional. The protagonist is unlikeable, and not in an interesting way.

It's the first book I DNF'd because it was just so bad. The main protagonist has just no agency, stuff simply happens to her. The writing feels so self-aware too, as if the author felt so incredible smart about themself because they could see the writing on the wall that social media companies are evil.

Pros: Idea interesting, and relevant.
Cons: Main character either not likeable, or just too stupid to like.

This book fits nicely into the 1984, Brave New World genre, albeit nowhere near as 'ground-breaking'. I enjoyed the narrative style and the story line although it was very predictable. No real profund truths were uneathed. I would place the story solidly in what my son calls the 'eye candy' genre- an entertaining read, without too much thought and introspection required.

Pretty good

I think it was pretty good. I really like it when books aren't afraid of making the main character seem like a terrible person. I hated Mae throughout the book.
There was also a lot of weird wording in it, and sometimes I'd have to reread stuff multiple times and I still wouldn't get it. For example, Annie told Mae something like, "I did so much better than you, suck it!" but it was written as "I did so much better than you suck it." Not a big deal, just felt really weird reading it.

Wow! Totally recommendable! A stunning book, couldn't put it down. It begins really slowly but then it's getting more and more and scary. The end is a big boom - made the story (and the message behind it) even stronger.

I enjoyed this book and am looking forward to the upcoming movie. I found its critique of the tension between transparency and privacy, particularly on the Internet, to be valuable. That said, in many ways this book suffered because it sometimes lacked subtlety in the way it presented this tension to the reader.

Done

I'm rating this book four stars in the same way I'd probably give Atlas Shrugged four stars. It's not great writing. The characters lack depth and development. And Eggers clearly has an agenda, using fictional characters to wave a red flag about the totalitarian state we're creating with Big Data.

And yet... Despite its numerous flaws, I raced through it. Every time I put the book down, something in the real world would rear its head to remind me that we're not that far away from the vision Eggers painted. And that, in turn, would make me pick it back up. Maybe it should've been named "A Vicious Circle," because that's what my reading of it was like.

Es una novela que me ha parecido extraña, no avanza como lo esperas puesto que aunque todo el tiempo van pasando cosas, por separado no son relevantes en casi todos los casos.
La base de la historia ha logrado por momentos ponerme hasta nervioso, con unos personajes consecuentes con dicha base y, aunque por momentos parecen hasta artificiales, eso ayuda a mejorar la atmósfera.

Solo me queda decir que el final es un poco anticlimático, y sorprende precisamente por ser un final lógico.

Powerful exploration of a plausible dystopian future we should avoid.

Hyped. Overrated. Very readable. Painfully naive protagonist.

If this book contains news for you I offer you my sincerest condolences. On the other hand: if it raises awareness on how we're squandering away our freedom to Facebook, google and their ilk I approve.

This book is not very good, but you should read it.