I'd read excerpts of, studied some of the lore of, and seen YouTube videos about the novel "Blindsight" but I'd never read the entire thing.
I'd been interested in it primarily because I heard it had a unique and realistic take on vampires, because it had an entire species that out-thought us even though it had no consciousness, and because that species ChatGPTed the humans it came into contact with.
I read the whole thing this Sunday since it is available for free on the author's website Blindsight by Peter Watts
There was not a single person in the entire story that I liked. I especially disliked Siri, the main character through which the entire story is told.
I think I liked Pag, but that's it. Everybody else was just terrible in one way or another.
I also strongly disagree with some of the philosophical points raised in the novel but that could just be me projecting.
I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of the hard sci-fi world-building he poured into it. That was some world class, well researched, speculative, near future projections of AI, cybernetics, space flight, genetics, neurology, psychology, biology, and astronomy.
I can't say I enjoyed reading it. It made me angry at times. I didn't like what it was saying and I didn't particularly care if the people I was reading about survived the ordeal.
At the same time, I read the whole thing in a single day. I couldn't put it down because I wanted to know what happened next.
I'd say that makes it a successful story.
#Blindsight #PeterWatts