The Most Read Books on Goodreads This Week

The future Korea in Park’s Luminous is unified. It also has a society that has integrated robots into its fabric — here, robots can be children, servants, and more. But even when the different between organic life and artificial life blurs, there is still a preference for the organic. Within this society are three estranged siblings, Morgan, Jun, and Yoyo — two of whom are organic, while one is robotic. War veteran-turned-detective Jun reconnected with his robot designer sister Morgan — who is secretly having an affair with one of her creations — because of an investigation he’s involved in. Meanwhile, an 11-year-old looking for robotic parts in a junkyard to save her failing body finds a remarkably lifelike robot boy named Yoyo. As the three siblings make their way back to each other — while Morgan prepares to launch a career-making robot boy, and Jun’s investigation takes him into Seoul’s underbelly — they must contend with their past and the question of what really makes one human.

Laila Lalami is a multi-award nominated author, and her latest reminds me of Minority Report as it questions how technology, privacy, and freedom can coexist. We follow Sara, who has just landed at LAX, and who is swiftly gathered up by agents who say that she will soon commit a crime against her husband. They came to this conclusion using data from her dreams and the Risk Assessment Administration’s algorithm. She’s taken to a facility and held there with other dreamers, all of whom are women and all of whom claim innocence of crimes not yet committed. Months pass before a new resident arrives who shakes things up. Now Sara is on a path to knuck if you buck against those who have taken her freedom.