Unlike anything you have ever read before, Set My Heart to Five is a love letter to outsiders everywhere. Plus it comes uniquely guaranteed to make its readers weep a minimum of 29mls of tears.* I don’t know if I it’s just because I have mild autism, but I totally identified with this robot from the beginning. I love the way he talks. I love reading a book that has words I have to look up! That hasn’t happened in I don’t know how long. Jared the bot develops complicated feelings after seeing a bunch of "old movies". These are classics that any movie love would have watched. He doesn't reference them by the titles, but by plots. And he describes them in a hilarious way. One day at a screening of a classic movie, Jared feels a strange sensation around his eyes. Everyone knows that bots can’t feel emotions, but as the theater lights come on, Jared is almost certain he’s crying. Confused, he decides to watch more old movies to figure out what’s happening. The process leads to an emotional awakening that upends his existence. Jared, it turns out, can feel.

The title of the book refers to a joke that Jared tells-again not because robots 'get' humour but because humans do-about the robot circuitry being a development of a toaster's. The early ones he explains, were literally toasted and destroyed-the worst thing a robot can conceive is being useless! Then Jared goes to see a movie and discovers he is crying. What is going on? What is he capable of? What will those who run the bot world do when they realize Jared may be able to experience emotions?Soon overwhelmed by powerful emotions, Jared heads west, determined to find others like himself. But a bot with feelings is a dangerous proposition, and Jared’s new life could come to an end before it truly begins. Unless, that is, he can somehow change the world for himself and all of his kind. Plotwise, it's an AI that's unexpectedly developing true sentience and emotions. We've seen this one a million times before, and the vast majority of those attempts are more interesting and nuance than this approach. This is not helped by our main character being pretty unlikeable; the characteristics they develop as they become "more human" start to turn them into an unpleasant person; there are possibly shades of the authors thoughts on what "being a man" means seeping through, and it's not entirely pleasant to say the least. As mentioned, if you've ever seen a film before, you'll know exactly how this goes, there's no surprises. There was one moment where the danger of an emotional climactic moment is fortunately sidestepped- fortunately for Stephenson, as I have no faith that they'd be able to write it well; less fortunate for the reader who desperately wants something interesting to happen. I have written two other books. ‘Set My Heart To Five’ came out in 2020. The Washington Post review said that I might be ‘Vonnegut’s first true protege’. You’d better believe I have been dining out on that ever since, and will be for the rest of my days. Unlike anything you have ever read before, Set My Heart To Five is a book for anybody who has feelings, loves movies, and likes to laugh and cry and sometimes do both at the same time. It comes uniquely guaranteed to make its readers weep a minimum of 29mls of tears.*

Production companies Working Title Films and Complete Fiction Pictures have optioned the film rights to the novel, and Stephenson himself is set to pen the film’s screenplay. The book will be published in the U.K. this summer by HarperCollins imprint 4th Estate, and in September in the United States. Let Not the Waves Of the Sea’, my memoir about losing my brother came out in 2012. It won Best First Book at the Scottish Book Awards, and was serialized on BBC Radio 4.This book was not what I was expecting. I was expecting a book in the vein of All Systems Red and the accompanying books, because that is a book about a bot who develops...unwarranted feelings/empathy/care, and this seemed like a similarly set up premise and therefore something I would like.