The Every Book Author Dave Eggers on His Sequel to The Circle – Bloomberg

Hi folks, its Brad in San Francisco. Next week comes thesequel to Dave Eggerss 2013 novel, The Circle, and a continuation of his satirical examination of how technology is changing humanity,but first

Todays top tech news:

The Circle was a wreck of a movie starring Emma Watson and Tom Hanks. But first, it was abestselling novel that depicted an omnipotent FacebookInc.-like company that pressures people into sharing every aspect of their lives. I enjoyed it! And now, eight years later, Eggers has returned to this all-too-plausible universe. The hero of the first book has become the villainous chief executive officer, and the company has rebranded itself as The Everyafter swallowing its Amazon.com Inc.-like rival, whose founder was only too happy to cash out and devote his time to space exploration with his fourth spouse. I guess regulators were sleeping on the merger review but stilllol.

In the new novelThe Every, a young idealist named Delaney joins the company as a customer service rep with the subversive idea that she can undermine the sprawling monopolist from the inside. She soon hits on a scheme to pitch a product so ridiculously invasive that the public will finally rebel and overthrow its tech overlord. As you can probably tell, the story is more belabored this time around, and if youre familiar with The Circles ending, you may be able to guess how her plans turns out.

Still, you should read Eggerss fictional take on technologys impact, not for the grinding plot machinations but for his disquieting world-building and scathing observations about techs grip on our minds. In Eggerss world, cameras and listening devices are mandated everywhere, conscientious objectors to the corporate-surveillance state are dubbed trogs and shunned, and a global hack known as The Release has exposed everyones email histories and led to a half-million suicides. Butpeople keep blithely clicking. The last vestige of freedomthe ability to move through the natural world unobservedfell away on a Friday, and no one noticed, he writes.

The book is also darn funny. An ultra-woke, environmentalist militancy has run amok, and nowbananas are being banned and people need to sign mutual contact agreements to even shake hands. Toilets are outfitted with a chirpy artificial intelligence, so they know exactly how much water to expend with each use. In the best recurring joke, male employees at The Every all dress like Sergey Brin from his spandex-wearing, midlife-crisis phase, sporting wrestler unitards that showcase their anatomy.

In an interview, Eggers said,I had a lot of fun writing this, and it shows. But his underlying themes are serious. Eggers told me hes enacting and inhabiting all my worst fears of what these companies can do. The target isnt just Silicon Valley but our own loyalty to tech companies and complicity with what he calls the full-panopticon level surveillance society.

I dont think most people necessarily realize just how much an inhibiting species change this isthis overwhelming, constant, unavoidable surveillance, Eggers said. Ive just been thinking for the last 20 years that weve been undergoing this species-level radical evolution, the fastest speciation that we have ever undergone, and we dont quite realize it. And its making us a far less interesting species and far more subservient to technology. No, Eggers doesnt own an Amazon Alexanor does he spend much time onemail. Our interview took place on old-fashioned telephone.

By the way, you wont be able to buy The Every on the everything store for another month or so. McSweeneys Publishing LLC, the nonprofit book and magazine publisher Eggers started in 1998, is giving independent bookstores anexclusive on the hardcover, before Vintage Books, a division of Random House, publishes the paperback, e-book and audiobook more widely in November. Its hard to imagine that Amazon, one target of Eggerss thought-provoking and wickedly dark satire, will mind very much. Brad Stone

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The Every Book Author Dave Eggers on His Sequel to The Circle - Bloomberg