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Reviews

The Electric State by Simon Stålenhag

indoorkeith's review

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adventurous dark reflective sad fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.25

The world Stålenhag creates overtop our own memory of the 90s is so vast and expansive even through the limited perspective of a single character making her way across Pacifica (California) with her mute kid drone brother.

With little words and lots of grim and grotesque art, the Electric State holds a mirror to technological advances and the pain they can cause from both as a consumer grade appliance and as a weapon of war. It paints a dark alternate past that increasingly feels like a not so distant possible future given current events.

The only thing that I wanted out of this book was more of the same, but enough was provided for readers to come up with their own conclusions or create completely new stories within the same desolate and morbidly beautiful world.
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bug_lightyear's review against another edition

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3.5

Read in 4h at 0.6 speed 
Quite boring, apparently the book has beautiful illustrations and definitely something is missing in the audiobook 

crayolabird's review

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adventurous mysterious sad medium-paced

4.0

In this spare yet chilling graphic novel, America as we know it has collapsed under the weight of giant machines and virtual reality headsets that first addict you and then slurp your brainpower.  Or, something like that.  The text leaves a lot of room for interpretation, so much so that along with the illustrations, our brains get to fill in the gaps in the story ourselves and the story is a sad one.  The illustrations are so gripping and I love the images of the little robot who is journeying with our main character, Michelle, as she tries to get somewhere. We aren't sure why she's going where she's going until much later in the book and when we do, I was sincerely surprised in the best of ways.  

I got this from the library because I saw that a new Netflix movie was coming out based on it.  This book gave me so much to think about and my twelve year old son, that also read it, had SO many thoughts about it.  It is a bit harsh and maybe he was a tiny bit too young for it (a few explicit sentences and several possibly upsetting illustrations) but I'm glad I let him give it a try.  For kids growing up in a world of iphones and VR headsets, allowing your brain to go down the slippery slope of what might happen in a world were "virtual" becomes more important than "reality"can be a really important exercise.

mickeymonk's review

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dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

novelnotions's review against another edition

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3.0

A short story about a young teenager and her robot traveling through a near-future dystopian US. Apparently this is being turned into something on a streaming service (Netflix?) soon and I look forward to watching it. I listened to this as a audiobook and it seems like this would have been a better physical read as there were pictures in the book to illustrate the narrative.

georgieem's review against another edition

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4.5

Well I'm scarred for life. 

Great art! 

I've never been more terrified by a book.

joshmann33's review

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dark slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

anahlik's review

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

5.0

mossyterra's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

This book was gorgeous. For what is essentially an art book with a short story, I was actually surprised by how much I enjoyed the story. The art is fantastic, and the atmosphere it paints—literally—gave me chills.
I highly recommend finding the artist’s music and listening to the album made for the book—it complements the experience perfectly. 

villainous_hoopdreams's review against another edition

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5.0

Gorgeous, chilling, and fragmented. It’s a complex, gorgeously imagined horror scape.