I was in the mood for some sci-fi and had this on my shelves. I’m so glad I picked it up - gritty and action packed, The Future was immediately gripping, while also being thoughtful about issues of race, inequality, technology, consumerism, you name it. The writing felt cinematic, and I hope this gets the film treatment, as her previous novel did. I remember there was a great deal of buzz around that book, The Power, and I never picked it up because the reviews were wildly mixed. I think I will rectify that now because I thoroughly enjoyed this one and loved the writing style, highlighting SO many passages:
“There were no clicks or eyeballs in the sensible, reasoned middle ground, and all the money in the world in encouraging users to rush to treat the extremes as if they were the center.”
“A forum full of sovereign individuals who’ve never even met in person can, by that fact, feel free to become a deeply interconnected community. Meanwhile a backwoods cult of conformity turns people inward, to the secret thoughts and the inner strengths they cannot share with others.”
“Every time, we begin again, again. The beginning does not foretell the end. There is no end.”
“The most persistent hauntings are the ghosts of lost futures.”
“That’s a rule of infinite vendetta: scroll back years through a social media timeline, the worst thing you can find another person has done is totally legit to do to them. But then, that’s the worst thing you’ve done, and it’s legit to do it to you. And on and on, everyone trapped inside this same worsening cycle. That’s where we are right now with the media and the internet: stuck inside a cave with the worst person we know, finding increasingly degrading things to do to each other and feeling righteous while we do them.”