[Review] "The Circle" by Dave Eggers

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Surveillance has gotten a lot of media attention lately (and a bit of attention on this very blog), and for good reason. So, it should be no surprise that it's also turning up in our dystopian novels!

"The Circle" is a dystopian novel by Dave Eggers. While fiction, it is set in a plausible universe which is alarmingly similar to present day, and it lays out a future which we could slide into if we are not careful about corporate and government surveillance. Eggers' message of the dangers of surveillance is both clear and harrowing.

I would strongly recommend this book to any of my friends, and I would make it required reading for technologists. As technologists, we hold the keys to either a great or terrible future, so we must together carefully weight the future we are creating.