I'm a special education teacher so I know a lot of individuals on the autism spectrum or who have hearing loss. The whole debate about Hadens (getting 'unlocked' or 'preserving Haden culture') reminded me strongly of the debate about deaf community and culture vs. Dust Jackets are not guaranteed and when still present, they will have various degrees of tear and damage. Essentially what has happened is a global pandemic, which has killed 400 million and left many millions more “locked in” meaning that they are left in a sleep like condition. This book took me too long to read, so important characters introduced in the beginning of the book were meaningless to me when I reached the solution.

A quarter of a century later, in a world shaped by what's now known as "Haden's syndrome," rookie FBI agent Chris Shane is paired with veteran agent Leslie Vann. Scalzi has some fun by showing our hero’s virtual room as like the Batcave, since he retreats to his dark lair to ponder on and solve crime. But this gets better because they can swap robots like we can exchange hire cars and in this way can leap about the globe with some ease and at rapid pace. I think that Neal Shusterman so far has been my favorite author to do that in a Urban setting with his Unwind Series.

That the puzzle piece symbol for autism awareness wrongly connotes that they're incomplete and need to be "solved. Lock In was fun and entertaining, and I had a fantastic time reading this, but I also feel this is a next step for the author.

I’ve been a big fan of his ever since I read Old Man’s War, and that’s also when I started associating his work with light, humorous sci-fi that’s also accessible and not too overwhelming for someone like me, who is predominantly a fantasy reader and not always in the mood for hard science fiction or heavy techno-jargon. Well two key issues for me were: 1) my personal dislike of stories with over-complex plots and a cast of thousands, and 2) it was starting to feel like one of those books where every problem is resolved by the disclosure of yet another new invention that just happens to fit this precise scenario. I'm not sure if Scalzi did this intentionally, but there were definite parallels at some points in the book. I don't think Scalzi was able to dig as deep as I might have liked, but what he did explore was fascinating. This is also vaguely reminiscent of Poul Anderson’s Harvest of Stars books where consciousness can be loaded onto a computer / android.The brains of those locked in were essentially linked up to humanoid personal transports affectionately named “Threeps” (after C-3PO of Star Wars fame), allowing them to interact with the world once more. This way the fast-talking, smart plotting and superb banter can have their full effect on the reader. Whereas a different author could craft a good image of a character in a reader's mind in 10 or 20 pages - it takes Scalzi 90 or even 100.

The Integrator is conscious throughout, but not fully in control; aware of what the other person is feeling, but not actually able to read their thoughts. I'm a little hesitant to say that because the story behind the story has a serious tone – a flu epidemic and a multi-murder investigation. This perspective has been present in much of his work; his exciting science fiction saga starting with Old Man’s War posits that the mutable physical self is but a prop or costume or useful tool for that which exists within. I like books that take a premise like what would happen if…and then expand on that to maybe 20-200 years into the future and then make a story around how would our world change because of that one thing. I thought there was a bit too many convenient contrivances ( for instance one of Chris's new roommates turns out to be an expert in programming that helps crack the case) and too much exposition at the end.Com várias pitadas de alívio cômico em cenas bastante tensas que em diversos momentos eu me censurava por estar rindo.