Crosstalk - Connie Willis

Description

Briddey is about to get exactly what she thinks she wants . . .

Briddey is a high-powered exec in the mobile phone industry, overseeing new products from concept ('anything to beat the new apple phone') to delivery. And she works with her wonderful partner, Trent. They've been together for six magical weeks, in a whirlwind of flowers, dinners, laughter and now comes the icing on the cake: not a weekend away or a proposal but something even better. An EDD. A procedure which will let them sense each other's feelings. Trent doesn't just want to tell her how much he loves her - he wants her to feel it.

Everything is perfect.

The trouble is, Briddey can't breathe a word of it to anyone (difficult, when the whole office is guessing) until she's had two minutes to call her family. And they're hounding her about the latest family drama, but when they find out about the EDD - which they will - they'll drop everything to interrogate her. And it might just be easier to have the procedure now and explain later.

Only Apple are poised to deliver an amazing new product and she has to be one step ahead . . . if she can only persuade their tech genius, C. B., to drop his crazy ideas about a 'privacy phone' with its 'do not disturb' settings, and focus on what people really want: more efficient, instinctive and immediate ways to communicate.

The race is on: not just for new, cutting-edge technology, but also for a shred of privacy in a public world and - for Briddey - a chance for love at the heart of it all.

This is a brilliant, heart-warming romantic comedy from one of the wittiest and wisest of our authors. Written with a light touch and a smile, we're swept up in Briddey's romance - and into the difficulties of a world just one technological step away from our own, as technology and social media blur (or indeed remove) the line between personal and public.

Review

I loved To Say Nothing of the Dog also by Connie Willis so I was really looking forward to reading this book. Unfortunately I was a little let down by the immense detail in the book which made for slow reading and kept losing my interest.

The book begins with Briddey about to get an EDD - an implant to be able to sense what someone you are emotionally bonded to is feeling and vice versa. As she has only been going out with Trent for six weeks it seemed a little drastic to me - but then so did the way her entire family kept trooping into the office to tell her their woes - how did any work get done in this place?

Of course nothing goes to plan and their are some radical complications after she has the EDD fitted and these form the basis of the book. She gets connected but to whom? 

There is nothing I love more than a great Sci-fi novel and this could have been one if it had been edited down more. Pages and pages of what was essentially the same thing over and over again, which I felt as the reader I had got the first time around. 

Glimpses of the plot kept me going as I was keen to find out was going to happen in the end. Certainly the last 100 pages or so the plot was more refined and less rambling and I was gripped. If only the book could have been more concise throughout.

I'm giving this book 3 out of 5 stars with thanks to Netgalley for a copy of the book for review.