I got annoyed with the sci fi pop culture references, but that’s always a problem for me (*cough cough Ready Player 1+2 cough cough*).

It had an interesting premise, and while the writing isn’t anything to brag about, Taylor kept the tone light and fun while dealing with the potential destruction of the world. Interestingly, I enjoyed the first book, We Are Legion, when we read it for the site’s book club many moons ago. Worlds are at stake, and honestly who could pass up the opportunity to explore the galaxy as a near immortal probe? Unfortunately, this puts him in competition with other countries with similar programs and he’ll have to play catchup. If he does not comply with their demands to be loaded into a self replicating space probe, he will be deleted, so of course he goes along with their game. Decades into the future, he finds his consciousness has been uploaded into a computer by a theocratic American government, known as FAITH. Bob Johansson was a computer programmer looking to live the rest of his life enjoying it, when he was struck by a car and killed. Okay, maybe I’m getting ahead of myself here.

The Bobiverse is a series of science fiction novels that follows one, well actually many, Bob Johanssons as they traverse the local star systems around the Sol system as Von Neumann probes. Anyway, with its fourth book being released in physical form later this month (already out on audible), I decided I should unnecessarily and aggressively dig into why I don’t like The Bobiverse by Dennis Taylor. You can blame the rest of the QTL staff on allowing me this indulgence. Oh, that’s just me? Well that’s okay, at least you might get some entertainment and insight into some works you may have considered reading while you watch me hurt myself. There is that quick hit of rage dopamine you get whenever the thing you hate does something you don’t like, and you can’t help but burn out those receptors and permanently ruin your brain chemistry. I imagine everyone does it on some small level. If you’re not familiar with me, you’ll first need to understand that I have a bad habit of reading things I hate, and reading too much into those things that I hate.

The bobiverse series