I think I am more familiar with the work of Ian McEwan than with any other author with the exceptions of Paul Auster and Haruki Murakami, although I do not have the love and appreciation for his books as do for the two that I mentioned. With the exception of Enduring Love (his best book, in my opinion) and Atonement, with special mention of his first two novels during his Ian Macabre phase, there is very little he puts out that I find great or even good, so I approach his work out of duty and with great apprehension. Sometimes they are forgettable, like Sweet Tooth, dismal like his most recent novel Nutshell and sometimes they are pretty good like his most recent novel Machines Like Me. This is another strange leap forward after the failure of Nutshell, dealing with an alternate Great Britain where Alan Turing is alive, and robots can purchase for large but reasonable amounts of money. The focus of the story is Charlie Friend, a 30-year-old man whose prime duty in life are wild schemes and even wilder failures. He is in love with Miranda, a student ten years younger than he is and once Charlie comes into a sum of money, he buys Adam, a human like robot with a tight moral compass that comes into conflict with both Charlie and Miranda. The bests parts of this book are the small scenes between two or three characters, whether it is the three central ones where an odd love triangle blossoms, with Mark, a foster child Miranda becomes attached to or Gorringe, a man from Miranda’s past who hold the key to a horrendous secret. The alternate history reads like microwave directions for anyone not familiar with what really happened, but the profound truths McEwan touches on with Adam and a late scene with Turing are among the richest McEwan has achieved.
Rating: 4/5
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