Bandwidth

<strong>Really slow.</strong><br /><br />Made a bad decision with this selection, it was free with Amazon First Book of April. After reading first 8% of it didn't even get what author was telling me, went back to beginning with my full attention on every word read it again. But finally finished the book, but it was really slow going.

{Video review <a target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiWYzASeCm8">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiWYz...</a> }<br /><br />Consider a world one step away from where we now reside, where logging on is as easy as waking up, where you carry your daily news feeds and conversations in your head and are able to access it whenever it is needed.<br /><br />Combine this instant access with the political realities of a political lobbyist and you have stepped into the world of Dag Calhoun. Add in today’s accusations of news manipulation but make the twists more insidious, more personal. What kind of power could be wielded if one could manipulate the thoughts of a single person by affecting his or her personal feed? <br /><br />Author Eliot Peper captures this world, fleshing it out for the reader and giving it life. As we descend into a realm of political intrigue, the author deftly weaves a tale that details the realities of Dag’s life, exposing the dangerous path he sometimes must tread. <br /><br />While light on the science aspect, the portrait of a man tossed by the whirlwinds of his own creations was fascinating. Dag is a complex character, torn by the desire to forge a different trail even as he is followed by the demons of his past. The behind-the-action scenes are realistic, providing the perfect backdrops. The author’s prose is descriptive and tight, with a matching plot that kept me turning pages from the beginning all the way to the end. Highly recommended. Five stars.

This book was a real stab in the dark for me; nobody recommended it to me, I hadn't read any reviews, I just liked the sound of it from the blurb and picked it up on a whim. I'm really glad I did.<br /><br />While the book isn't entirely without faults; the author is a little too fond of the information dump and the prose occasionally gets a little purple; overall I really enjoyed it.<br /><br />It's well researched and intelligently written. Of all the speculative fiction I've read over the last four decades, this book presents one of the most convincing futures for humanity. It's all the more scary as a result, particularly as this is quite a near future.<br /><br />There's intrigue, action, espionage (of the corporate variety), sex, politics, murder and even a little romance to be had here. I had a blast reading it and will definitely be reading more from Peper in the future.

Right off the bat, author Eliot Peper thrust me into a life-and-death situation. Barely had time to get my feet on the ground and already I'd narrowly dodged a hail of bullets. Gave me insight for what lie down the road. Intense action to get this well-written narrative rolling. Heart thumping, my kind of opening scene. Knew I wouldn't fall asleep. As the storyline unfurled, I became intimately aware of the digital footprint we all leave in our daily wake. Our very souls are up for the taking. Startled to realize just how easily we could be manipulated through this digital kingdom we nonchalantly thrive in. Nowhere to hide. Twists and turns guided me down a vicious path of well-drawn characters to an ending I never saw coming.<br /><br />Some of Dag Calhoun's roles as lobbyist frequently placed his life at serious risk. Just narrowly missed eating a bullet with his cup of coffee. Not a good way to end a meeting. The person he had chosen to meet with was not so fortunate. Often wondered if there could ever be enough compensation for that. He'd cornered the market as a razor chewing lobbyist. A hungry tiger expert at raising his clients goals above all else. A dream maker. He'd finally reached the pinnacle of the lobbyist game. The world, so it seemed was at his feet. Not for long. It was all about to change.<br /><br />Dag had met a woman who had invited him over to her hotel room. A romantic rendezvous loomed in the immediate future. Just what he needed. When he arrived, the door had been left ajar. She was not there. Alone, he was stunned to find damning documentation and intimate pictures of his life, his work plastered all over the walls of the hotel room. Stunned, he'd been targeted and sabotaged. Beyond damage control. Enough evidence was there to bring him and his company crashing down. Who was this woman? The one that called herself Emily.<br /><br />Dag needed to confront her. Had to find out her motivation behind the gut-wrenching hotel fiasco. His painstaking search led him to one of the remote San Juan Islands. When he secretly arrived there, she was not alone. Far from it. The island harbored a school for wayward youths. Those that needed saving. It also turned out that Emily was a polished political activist. An art that she'd taken to the highest level. Dag didn't know what he had gotten himself into. The hunter becomes the prey. In over his head from which there would be no escape.<br /><br />Orchestrated over years, Dag's life had been literally hacked. His every thought, every emotion had been created by a team of skilled psychologists. He's been setup. Made him into the man he was. Thought he was. Like Legos. Built from the ground up. The very essence of his being, his mind, his thoughts had been constructed at the will of others. Unknowingly, Dag had become the Frankenstein of psychological conditioning. Brainwashed to another's way of thinking. My nerves frayed. Realization hit me like a 5 lb hammer across the skull. I'd realized the most frightening consequence of all. It's all so plausible. Just waiting to happen.<br /><br />My thanks sent to NetGalley and 47North for this ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.

Spectacular.<br /><br />I've been a friend and avid reader of Eliot's books since the first draft of his first book in the Uncommon Series. It's been a delight to follow his writing career.<br /><br />With Bandwidth, he's at a new level. My favorite genre is what I like to call "near-term sci-fi" - tech that is within five to ten years but set in a contemporary context.<br /><br />As we still try to figure out as a society what impact of social media - specifically Twitter and Facebook - has played (and is playing) in current socio-political manipulations, Eliot's conception of "the Feed" as the core part of our existence is spot on. And, the hidden hideaway of Analog in San Francisco is deliciously ironic as a counterpart to The Battery.<br /><br />But best of all is the fast pace, short chapters, endless twists and turns, and - as is revealed near the end - game upon game upon game - which is an essential part of the meaningless meaning that humans give life.

Because it's only fair to say why I didn't like a book - it was this kind of sentence that did it:<br /><br />"But it was also the first ray of light entering a boarded-up house in a condemned neighborhood as a hopeful squatter adjusted his sweaty grip on a crowbar and pried the plywood from a broken window."<br />

<strong>Book Review</strong><br /><br />Boring. The author is more concerned with his command of the English language than the tale he wants to tell. It seems as though he is more concerned with the use of words than the audience.<br /><br />I couldn't finish the book.

If the privacy atrocities of Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scare you, but this near-term sci-fi thriller may read to you more as a horror than a thriller.<br /><br />Eliot Peper has truly shown his writing strengths flourish in this novel, providing not only a great mix of sci-fi visioning but also fantastic storytelling technique. He is able to add the texture that helps turn a book into an extraordinary experience.<br /><br />Don't miss this novel, it's going to be one of the most talked about books of the year for sure.

Too slow and uninteresting. I just couldn't get into it despite the interesting synopsis.

ok. I made it to about 70%, but a lot of that was skimming. The idea of manipulating our "feeds" was pretty timely, considering recent news about Facebook posts being used to manipulate voters. And the idea of "the ends justifying the means" definitely deserves some study. But I just never got caught up in this particular story. As I said, a lot of skimming. I just wanted to get the story and I wanted it to develop a bit better. So, what I read was "ok", hence the 2 stars for a book I didn't finish, but I just didn't care enough to actually push through to the end.