Autonomous - by Annalee Newitz (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Autonomous is the highly anticipated debut from science journalist and founder of the science and sci-fi blog io9 Annalee Newitz, a novel that explores humanity's technology and culture in a future where everything--and everyone--is a product.

Earth, 2144. Jack is an anti-patent scientist turned drug pirate, traversing the world in a submarine as a pharmaceutical Robin Hood, fabricating cheap scrips for poor people who can't otherwise afford them. But her latest drug hack has left a trail of lethal overdoses as people become addicted to their work, doing repetitive tasks until they become unsafe or insane.

Hot on her trail, an unlikely pair: Eliasz, a brooding military agent, and his robotic partner, Paladin. As they race to stop information about the sinister origins of Jack's drug from getting out, they begin to form an uncommonly close bond that neither of them fully understand.

And underlying it all is one fundamental question: Is freedom possible in a culture where everything, even people, can be owned?

"Autonomous is to biotech and AI what Neuromancer was to the Internet."--Neal Stephenson

"Something genuinely and thrillingly new in the naturalistic, subjective, paradoxically humanistic but non-anthropomorphic depiction of bot-POV--and all in the service of vivid, solid storytelling."--William Gibson

Review Quotes

"Newitz always sees to the heart of complex systems and breaks them down with poetic ferocity."--N. K. Jemisin, author of the Broken Earth trilogy and The City We Became

"Autonomous is to biotech and AI what Neuromancer was to the Internet."--Neal Stephenson

"Something genuinely and thrillingly new in the naturalistic, subjective, paradoxically humanistic but non-anthropomorphic depiction of bot-POV--and all in the service of vivid, solid storytelling."--William Gibson

"This book is a cyborg. Partly, it's a novel of ideas, about property, the very concept of it, and how our laws and systems about property shape class structure and society, as well as notions of identity, the self, bodies, autonomy at the most fundamental levels, all woven seamlessly into a dense mesh of impressive complexity. Don't let that fool you though. Because wrapped around that is the most badass exoskeleton--a thrilling and sexy story about pirates and their adventures. Newitz has fused these two layers together at the micro- and macro-levels with insight and wit and verbal flair. Moves fast, with frightening intelligence." --Charles Yu, author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe

"Annalee Newitz has conjured the rarest, most exciting thing: a future that's truly new ... a terrific novel and a tremendous vision." --Robin Sloan, author of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

"Holy hell. Autonomous is remarkable." --Lauren Beukes, bestselling author of Broken Monsters

"Everything you'd hope for from the co-founder of io9 ... Combines the gonzo, corporatized future of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash with the weird sex of Charlie Stross's Saturn's Children; throws in an action hero that's a biohacker version of Bruce Sterling's Leggy Starlitz, and then saturates it with decades of deep involvement with free software hackers, pop culture, and the leading edge of human sexuality." --Cory Doctorow, New York Times bestselling author of Walkaway.

More praise for Scatter, Adapt, and Remember:

"Fascinating.... [Newitz is] an excellent writer, with an effortless style.... The inner science geek in all of us will uncover some really cool stuff.... A terrific book that covers an astounding amount of ground in a manageable 300 pages... You will be smarter for it."
--San Francisco Chronicle

"An enormous amount of knowledge is gathered here, and the book accomplishes something almost impossible, being extremely interesting on every single page. A real pleasure to read and think about." --Kim Stanley Robinson, author of the Mars trilogy

"A refreshingly optimistic and well thought out dissection of that perennial worry: the coming apocalypse. While everyone else stridently shouts about the end of days, this book asks and answers a simple question: 'If it's so bad, then why are we still alive?'... Newitz inspires us with engaging arguments that our race will keep reaching the end of the world and then keep living through it. Scatter, Adapt, and Remember intimately acquaints the reader with our two-hundred-thousand-year tradition of survival--nothing less than our shared heritage as human beings."--Daniel H. Wilson, author of Robopocalypse and Amped

About the Author

ANNALEE NEWITZ is an American journalist, editor, and author of fiction and nonfiction. They are the recipient of a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship from MIT, and has written for Popular Science, The New Yorker, and the Washington Post. They founded the science fiction website io9 and served as Editor-in-Chief from 2008-2015, and subsequently was Editor-in-Chief at Gizmodo and Tech Culture Editor at Ars Technica. Their book Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction was nominated for the LA Times Book Prize in science. Their first novel, Autonomous, won a Lambda award, and their new novel The Future of Another Timeline is out Sept. 2019.