I feel like Feed could have been a better book, even though it was in fact, a very good book. The story tells a potential future of consumerism and digital reliance. People have chips embedded in their brains that basically give them a constant connection to a futuristic version of our own internet. It's an obvious criticism of the times we live in and our own internet addictions. Too obvious, in fact.

The perspective is that of a teenage boy who acts and thinks, for the most part, like teenage boys do. He has rowdy friends and teenage thoughts. He meets a girl who had her "feed" implanted later in life than most, and because of this she is different. The book is a pseudo-love story, or at least it might have been if the main character wasn't so incredibly un-likable. But that's the paradox of Feed. It's trying so hard to get across this message that being hooked in will destroy society that it can't, at the same time, be a real story. I never grew to like the narrator, he never really changes, and in the end I'm wishing I could have seen the story through the female love interest's eyes (name: Violet).

I think maybe my problem with this criticism of how we Americans live is the assumption that we're all doomed, that we all just continue to plod along, unthinking, uncaring, and content to be duped into buying and consuming all that we see before us. Perhaps for many, this is true, but I find myself continually made aware of all the negative effects the "machine" and made aware in a much less obvious and blunt ways than Anderson puts across with Feed.

At the same time, I think this is maybe an important book to read, particularly for a younger audience (which is why it's aptly called a Young Adult book). Some of us may wake up to the perils of an "American" lifestyle early, but the majority probably need this hammer of a reminder that is Feed. Thus, I can not blame Anderson for not creating a great story because he's created something important regardless.