The Circle

The Circle by Dave Eggers
497 pages
What’s it about?

Mae is a few years out of college and hates her boring job with a utility company. She finally asks her best friend Annie to help her get on with the big tech firm that Annie had started with right after they graduated. With Annie's help and support Mae finds herself in a new fabulous world where all her needs are met and she is truly a part of a community. But when does "community" go too far?

What did it make me think about?

This book was so timely for me! Like many of us I struggle with the role of social media in my life, and although this was a dystopian novel and takes many issues to an extreme, it certainly had a point to make. Keep in mind I am saying this as I prepare to post this review online! At what point do we lose our individuality to the opinions of the masses? Do we really need to share everything? What is the role of privacy in our actual relationships versus our online relationships? How real are all our crafted online identities? So much to think about here!

Should I read it?

I recommend this novel! I had read about this book when it first came out but some of the reviews (and Dave Eggers reputation as a literary heavyweight) made me put it off. At the advice of a friend I picked it up and started it on a plane flight (the easiest way for me to get into a difficult book). What a surprise! This book just flew by for me. Although Mae could have been a stronger more vivid character (most people have a little more backbone-right?) her story still kept my interest. Also the book was dystopian, but it was different in that the world had not been destroyed. I certainly can not think of a book that would create as much conversation as this novel would generate. Book clubs take notice!

Quote-

"The flash opened up into something larger, an even more blasphemous notion that her brain contained too much. That the volume of information, of data, of judgements, of measurements, was too much, and there were too many people, and too many desires of too many people, and too many opinions of too many people, and too much pain from too many people, and all of it constantly collated, collected, added and aggregated, and presented to her as if that all made it tidier and more manageable- it was too much."

Maybe 2.5 stars?? I really wanted to like this one. And yes, I only picked it up because of the new movie being released, but the book was disappointing. While the concept and the subject matter is timely and riveting, I found it hard to believe that so many people were blindly and easily convinced to give up their privacy. If the book would have included pockets of resistors or people rising up to challenge The Circle, it would have been more convincing. And I couldn't muster any real feelings for Mae, the naive main character; she was flat and predictable. For maybe the first time, I'm hoping the movie is nothing like the book. There are, however, some very quote-worthy passages that made me take a closer look at the pitfalls of social media. My favorite:

“Listen, twenty years ago, it wasn’t so cool to have a calculator watch, right? And spending all day inside playing with your calculator watch sent a clear message that you weren’t doing so well socially. And judgments like ‘like’ and ‘dislike’ and ‘smiles’ and ‘frowns’ were limited to junior high. Someone would write a note and it would say, ‘Do you like unicorns and stickers?’ and you’d say, ‘Yeah, I like unicorns and stickers! Smile!’ That kind of thing. But now it’s not just junior high kids who do it, it’s everyone, and it seems to me sometimes I’ve entered some inverted zone..."

I have never read anything like The Circle. I think the concept was scary and ever since reading The Circle, I notice more the hold social media has over everything. Although I enjoyed the book as a whole, there were times when I was waiting for the point, the climax. I feel let down that there really wasn't a satisfying conclusion to the book and I feel that all the description about the main character's "zinging" etc was filler for lack of a comprehensive plot. All in all though, i enjoyed it and the creepy concept still sticks with me.

Egger's premise, the dawning of a totalitarian society due to technology and social media, is captivating because it hits close to home in this age of digital voyeurism. Egger's writing, however, falls flat when it comes to character development and the deft use of language to transport the reader into the utopian circle he's created.

Could be final more exciting. The rest is absolutely fine!