Intense realism, religious extremism - if you had the power to change the future and save the planet what would you do to see it done? The Future, this future - which (future) is the book and what is our reality? The warnings in the book could so easily have been taken from our headlines - cataclysmic corruption leads to the end for all but those who have the foresight to prepare for what is coming. This book left me reeling, trying to keep up with Lai as she unravels the secrets that led up to the collapse of civilization, and her fight with those left behind to save what was left. Thought provoking and terrifying - I couldn't put the book down. (less)

Very compelling premise but hard for me to stay engaged with… very difficult to stay anchored to this story because of all the unlikeable characters and changes in POV. not my favorite.

<i>The future calls us on one painful step at a time and the first rule of life is to survive.</i>

<i>The Future</i> is a well written novel in the sci-fi / dystopia realm of things. It is told from the perspective of a longer list of characters over different timelines that end up connecting together.

Two of the female leads are preppers or survivalists who are smart and ready to take on the end of days. The others are billionaires or children of them who run major tech companies, similar to today’s social media platforms… one with a bird logo that leads to the obvious.

I enjoyed the high tech part of this and could see how much of this could be reality, if it’s not already.

However, the book lost me about 3/4’s of the way through and I didn’t love the “twist” at the end. Also didn’t particularly like any of the characters. That made this feel really long since I didn’t really care what happened to any of them.

<i>The only way to really control the future is if you’re the one making it happen.</i>

Many thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. <i>The Future</i> drops November 7, 2023.

Be warned this book is broken up into different sections which can make the timeline a bit jumpy but besides that I enjoyed this book

Absolutely brilliant!! This novel by Naomi Alderman is a well written science fiction story that hits scarily close to home. Alderman draws on the realities of a technology obsessed world that is destroying itself in its process toward what is thought to be a “better” future.

In the book, tech moguls are ruling the world and are confident in their ability to survive the inevitable apocalypse. Others spend time online chatting on end-of-day forums, sharing survival tips and religious perspectives. As various groups are working toward different outcomes, it leaves the reader wondering if the world be saved or destroyed.

This novel is as much philosophy as it is science fiction. It could also be considered an apocalypse tale. It was a fascinating read and would make a fantastic book club selection as there is much discussion that can be had. I am looking forward to reading other works by this author.

Thank you to #NetGalley for an eARC and #Simon&SchusterBookClubFavorites for an ARC of #TheFuture by #NaomiAlderman in exchange for honest feedback. -5 stars

what happens when techbro ecofascists fuck the lives of the planet and everyone in it? "the future" seeks to explore that.

in the not-so-distant future, three techbro billionaires control just about everything. software, hardware, stocks, oil, charitable funds, etc. when their hardcore crazy AI end times predictor gives them a warning that they are in imminent danger of apocalyptic events, they run off to hide in their majorly secure bunker which is eight stories and cost billions of dollars. do they warn the rest of the world? no! they save themselves (and maybe a few others) because that's what they do.

zehn is a chinese-american lesbian who gets sucked into this mess when she starts a love affair with one of the techbro's glorified secretaries. she's smart enough to survive, she posts her own videos about survival techniques. but will she?

warning: this book is long. but it is so fucking good. do you ever read something and become deeply engrossed in it to the point that if anyone tries to talk to you, you want to scream at them? yeah, this book got me. it's fun, it's twisty, it's silly, it's relevant, it's true, and it gives the socialist some hope for the future.

eat the rich!!!!

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

Naomi Alderman is an expert at giving the reader a masterful ploy of twists and turns. I take pride and joy in being able to predict what comes next in the plot but in this is instance, I didn’t feel any urge to even try. I was eager and enjoyed following the story as long as deemed necessary. At times while reading was it a lot of information? Yes. Did it scare me a little about how valid and unnerving some ideas about technology were? Also yes. Even so, I still kept reading. Having read and loved Alderman’s previous book The Power, I was excited but with caution. I didn't want to get my hopes up too high. This book is a standout on its own. The multiple perspectives and keen details you’ll find in both books but they are each their own story. Plus, LGBTQ+ representation was a nice bonus. A great read but make sure you give yourself the chance to take in all the ideas that come from it, some are subliminal while some might be from what a few of you are holding in your hands right now.

"It is not possible to express this with symbols. All the symbols can ever be is a flag in the sand pointing at where to dig. You have found the treasure. It is the world as it is."


Thank you to Naomi Alderman, NetGalley, and Simon & Schuster.

The Power tackled sexism and The Future tackles capitalism. This book is about a group of billionaire leaders that are helping towards the destruction of the planet while secretly preparing for their own safety in secret. It is not a stretch of the imagination to take these fictional characters and relate them to real ones in today’s society. It was a very interesting read and I recommend it. It was not quite as powerful for me as The Power was, but it is still an interesting concept and worth the read. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this advanced copy.

This is one of the best books I've read all year. The concept was really intriguing and I found myself surprised at the twists and turns—which is unusual. I found the pacing to be a bit slow to start but really picked up around the 30% mark and I couldn't put it down.

The publisher's synopsis of this novel makes it sound fascinating, a definite must read. Sadly, the synopsis was a much more interesting read than the actual book.

I tried very hard to get through this. I really did. I got one third of the way through and, just couldn't take it anymore. Prose that was drier than a desert in July, characters that all had the personality of a baked potato, and a story that pulls you here, and there, and back here, and over there. I got whiplash from trying to figure out if we were in the present, or the past, or the future.

Conversation and/or dialogue between characters was nonexistent. We are literally told everything without being able to try and ferret out their feelings/thoughts/motives for ourselves. There is a running lecture on Lot, his family, and Sodom. I never did figure out the significance. It felt like the author knew but didn't want to wait for the reader to catch up. So, it kept going on and on. And on. And on.

So, again, full confession, I DNF this novel. I did jump to the last chapter to see if things picked up (more of the same) and the 'epilogue' (set Many, Many Years later). I had to struggle to get through these two. Not because I was lost or didn't know what was going on. But because it was so much more of the same never-ending dusty prose, lack of personalities, and just ho hum, don't care about any of these people or what happened to them.

I have no doubt there are readers out there who would enjoy this type of writing. I did not.

The Future is an exciting sci-fi thriller with a lot of big ideas and some plot twists I didn’t see coming. I found the story compelling, and I enjoyed the back-and-forth between the past and present narrations (although that occasionally made it difficult for me to remember what was happening in the main plot). Unfortunately, some sections of the novel felt disjointed, and the last couple sections were especially jarring when compared to everything that came before. Overall, though, this was still a very good book, and I’d recommend it to anyone who enjoys dystopian thrillers.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for a digital ARC of this book.

The Future by Naomi Alderman was a delightful book. I listened to this narrator and I was engrossed in the story almost immediately.. I enjoy the interplays between the characters and their development through the story. It's a thought invoking story that I would suggest you pick up and read.

I really tried to like this, but I just had a really hard time. I couldn't get into it and had to start it over several times. It had a lot of promise, I liked the idea, but it all just fell flat for me. I felt at times like there were many agendas being pushed on me and once I get that feeling, it's hard to shake. I don't know if that was the authors intent, but a lot of it all just felt really forced and stereotypical.

I did think the message boards were a nice touch. I enjoyed those and they were a good way to break up the other parts of the story, but overall the pace seemed slow. I'm not sure what exactly made the book unenjoyable for me. It's hard to pinpoint. I just think it was a mixture of things. There were too many characters, I think...which usually doesn't bother me, but this time I got confused. I think maybe it's because they all had very unique names. I guess that's my problem, not the author's.

Honestly, I think one thing that bothered me was I got this feeling like the author thought she was better and smarter than me. Again, that may have been a personal problem, but it felt a little pretentious.

I really appreciate the opportunity to read it. Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley.

This book gripped me, made me think, and made me tell all of my friends. It's technically science fiction, but in the vein of Margaret Atwood, not aliens and spaceships. It's a thinly veiled criticism of the way we let a few companies dominate our world, despite the fact that they don't have our interests at heart. When they talk about the future, they are talking about the hope that they, at least, will survive the future disasters that they have failed to prevent for the rest of us. They are talking about a future that they'll ride out in their bunkers while the rest of us burn. And yet, the book is more nuanced than a simple lecture on the evils of tech. The narrative is interspersed with long musings on biblical stories, for a reason that is unclear at first but eventually weaves the story together. This is a book I'll be thinking about for months, and it was a breeze to read. I was barely able to put it down even two hours after my bedtime.

The first half of this book dragged some for me, but it started to picked up about half way through. I enjoyed the twists and turns of the story and the different ecological and religious themes throughout. The message board sections were a nice way to break up sections of the book and kept me engaged. I do wish we would have had a few more chapters from the POVs of some of the more interesting side characters.

Not sure how a book can be at once a reflection of our dystopian reality and a glimpse into a more hopeful future but here we are. Lots of themes at play, religious overtones, survivalists, extremists, and a long monologue about machine learning and what it really is. Lots of moving pieces: you'll figure about halfway in specifically where this is going and all the threads connecting and unraveling and connecting again is interesting. It did go on a bit too long in parts (particularly the message boards) but there wouldn't have been any other way to easily put in the end of days and prescient beliefs of a now dead cult leader. It's depressing bc so much of what is written is happening, in real time, even as I post this and is part of the larger problem.

Just outsmart the algorithm.

I tried so hard to like The Future! I loved Naomi Alderman's Power, so I was excited to get this ARC. However, I couldn't follow the story. I actually tried to read this book more than once. Both times, the first few chapters got me, but I lost the thread about a third of the way in. It's fascinating to me how much other readers enjoyed the chat/reddit-like forums because those parts were the hardest for me to integrate. I think it's possible some of the challenges I had in reading The Future will be resolved in the final version (for example, with these chat forums, the text is all broken and confusing and I'm betting that will be visually clearer/cleaner when published), but I couldn't resolve them for me on this ARC. I had high hopes, but this landed flat for me. I'd be willing to try another Alderman novel, given there were elements of this I enjoyed and I liked Power so much. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I am wanted to love this book more, but it honestly felt too drawn out with characters that I could not fully connect to and just fell flat to me. I loved the concept of this book with technology, AI, climate change, disparities between social groups, and the influence it may hold with “the end times” and extremist views. Good ending, just too long.

This tale of social media, global warming, greed and good intentions is an excellent follow up to Naomi Alderman’s previous book, The Power, which dealt with societal power dynamic changes. The Future shows a world not far from our own, being moved closer to apocalypse by tech giants whose only concern is money. As with The Power, Alderman weaves her separate characters together with her signature wit and humor. Martha and Lai Zhen form the emotional core of the story, as their backstories feed into not only how to save the world but why. My only caveat: after the characters flee the end of the world, which should be exciting, it comes across a bit dull. Don’t let that deter you; One small dip in a very enjoyable read!
#SimonBooks

Thank you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for access to the eARC of "The Future".

I liked it.

I was ready to worship this book, being a fan of the author. But unfortunately much of the book was a bit of a slog. A lot of backstory, which I admit was necessary--mostly--for plot reasons. But not always, or so it seemed. I enjoyed the twists and turns, and appreciate that the structure of the novel leans literary and is just inherently slower paced. And while the concept is great, and for all I know unique, the execution didn't work for me. This is strange for me to say, because generally speaking I enjoy medium-to-slow pacing. But with this book it took a lot of sense of duty in both having been graciously allowed ARC access and being a fan of Alderman to keep reading.

The concept, and all that happened in the story, what we find out nearing the end, is spectacular and for all I know truly unique. By Part 3 I was hoping this would happen in reality.

The writing style is also to my liking.

Because the concept and writing were truly great, I'm torn as how to rate this novel, because I did not enjoy the execution. Maybe this just means I wish some slower, deep backstories had been cut. Maybe there were too many characters. I can't pinpoint the actual issue, so perhaps it's a complicated reasoning even I can't fish out.

One thing that bugged me a little was the highly speculative aspects regarding the island. This part of the story felt like the Hunger Games and MaddAddam blended together to form this concept. This isn't a wholly BAD thing (I love THG) nor is it surprising given Alderman's connections to Atwood. It just bugged me a little, I guess, my disbelief floating in the stratosphere rather than just being suspended.

Given much of the time I was just bored, I can't give this 5 stars. But it was good enough for 3.75. Sorry, Naomi. Don't worry, I'll still buy your books.