Review: We Are Legion (We Are Bob)

Mild spoilers for the book...

This novel wasn't the most impactful, artful, or memorable book I've ever encountered. But it was charming enough that I burned through it in about two days and didn't want to put it down. 

This novel explored several common sci-fi themes through the narrative vehicle of a man (Bob) who finds his consciousness preserved in a digitized form after being cryogenically frozen. Bob is from our modern day, and finds himself a digital "replicant" in a distant and hugely altered future Earth. Bob's ultimate purpose is to be uploaded to a "Von Neumann probe," a theoretical space exploration platform with the capability to self-replicate.

Perhaps the most interesting theme of the book, which I hope is developed further in the rest of the series (yes, this is my first read-through) is the relationships and divergence of aspects of the original human Bob's personality in the many copies that are created as the probes spread. The plot threads also great more difficult to follow as the number of these multiplied, even with each adopting their own distinct name. 

Multiple interesting plot-threads emerge, including the original Bob replicant exploring and taking an active role in aiding a primitive non-human species (touching on themes related to “The Prime Directive” that are perhaps better treated in other works). Another group of Bobs seeks to save the remnants of humanity from a dying world, while others continue to fight the remaining probes of other human factions. It begins to get a bit complicated to keep track of who is who, especially since they’re actually all Bob…

Other all, I enjoyed the book. I wouldn’t categorize it as art in the same sense of other influential sci-fi novels, but it provides a really interesting scenario to explore the various sci-fi tropes that occur.

I think my major reservations with this work come down to the authorial tone throughout. There’s almost a certain requirement to have watched some original Star Trek and other cultural topics that both can't be assumed, and the sneakiness and often unfunny jokes undermine any gravitas in the language. On that point, the reason I was able to essentially "binge read" this novel was that the vocabulary generally stuck to about a high school reading level. My other critique is that at times the narrative, particularly in the space battles or techno-babble, indeed skated over some description that made it more difficult to follow. It’s fine if Bob is an unreliable narrator, but he’s also a computer computing orbital intercepts in combat. More technical readouts aren’t wholly inappropriate.

Overall, as the extended internal monologue of the experience of a computerized being, it also lacked more evocative or descriptive language throughout the novel that an omniscient narrator would have afforded. On the flip side, generally it was apparently that a distinct personality flavor or strain developed in each Bob copy, with slightly different voice—this was not always consistent though, which also placed impetus on the reader to be sure to track the chapter headers indicating the date and which ”Bob” was speaking.

Style: 2

Substance: 3.5

Overall, a fun, quick read. Not one that will force you to think a lot, but that touches on many classic tropes in an interesting way. It’d probably be a pretty good reoccurring television series.