Hum... a novel

Hum by Helen Phillips, 2024. I just finished reading this novel today and I'm not sure of my impressions yet. It is still sinking in. I don't remember where I first saw this book but I did put an e-book hold on it at the library right away. It took about two months waiting when suddenly it was available. I was reading a couple of other books so at first I thought of sending it back and waiting but who knows now long it would take. Already I saw that there were six people waiting for my copy so I jumped in. That was December 3rd.

It was a slim novel and it took me just under a week to read it. There were times when I wasn't sure if I wanted to continue. There were many interesting aspects to the story but it didn't really grab me overall in the way I was expecting. Something was missing or just so different and I'm still not sure what it was. The story was rather dystopian and in a way it was a social media horror tale or a good reason to never pick up a cell phone again. It was really scary. 

It takes place in a near future city overcome with climate change and full of intelligent robots called "hums". It really was a very serious critique of our current technology and what could happen in the very near future it we're not careful. It felt like that dystopian society was actually really happening today and even more so under the current threat of the magat control of the government. A very chilling world of capitalism run amok. This novel would also be an example of a story exploring the new world of "brain rot" caused by excessive social media use that some in the medical field have been warning about. Reading this made me fear for my grandchildren and the influence of their devices.