Feed by M.T. Anderson

Separated into four sections, this futuristic story follows Titus and his friends as they travel to the Moon to party at a nightclub, meet Violet, and live their lives connected to the Feed. In the future, nearly all humans have a transmitter implanted in their heads that provides a constant feed of information, not unlike having a ticker tape constantly running. The Feed also allows them to look up information on the spot, and to converse without spoken words, much like instant messaging. After a strange event at a nightclub, Violet and Titus begin dating. Titus soon finds that her points of view tend to be unique from the norm. Violet openly challenges the Feed by purposefully trying to confuse it. She also has a habit of saying socially inappropriate things to Titus’s friends. She encourages Titus to fight against the Feed. Eventually her Feed becomes defective, causing her to be disconnected from Titus, and the rest of the world. Although Titus sees her goal of challenging the norm, and truly loves Violet, he's not sure he can break away from the Feed.

At first I was frustrated by the futuristic language of this book. I didn’t enjoy trying to figure out the “new” words Anderson had created. But as I read further, it became much less obtrusive. The story itself deals with important topics like conformity, thinking for oneself, challenging the norm, love, and independence. Anderson handles them all by providing a character whose internal monologue is blunt and honest. The reader sees all of his internal struggle without censoring. The book illustrates Titus’s struggles with peer pressure and his quest to fit in, even as he can fully appreciate Violet’s goal of identity independent of the feed. I think that all teens can relate to these issues in some way.

I ended up liking this book a lot, even though I didn’t think that I would. I’m not usually much of a science fiction fan, but this book was written incredibly well. The book forces the reader consider the prevalence of media and pre-fabricated information. Even if this seems to be an ambitious goal for a YA book, it succeeds. I absolutely recommend reading it.