Thanks to NetGalley, I got to read an advanced copy of The Ten Percent Thief by Lavanya Lakshminrayan. It was bloody marvellous! A tapestry of short story-style chapters focusing on different characters, all set in a dystopian future where people live in a meritocratic society, split into undesirable “analogs” and privileged “virtuals”. I’d love to see a TV adaptation of it! Definitely recommend this one when it comes out in March ❤️

The end game of forced distribution ‘performance management’ systems

+++ Thanks to NetGalley and Solaris / Rebellion Publishing for ARC review copy +++

In The Ten Percent Thief, Lavanya Lakshminarayan conjures up dystopian future with a societal structure born of corporate HR and unfettered Artificial Intelligence.

The future version of Bangalore is split into Virtuals (tech connected, fully fledged citizens) and Analogs (tech deprived outcasts living outside the comfort of protected bio-domes.)

The Virtuals constantly strive to demonstrate ‘productivity’ which determines their place on the BellCorp ‘curve.’ High performers are rewarded with greater status and privileges, whilst the bottom 10% may be cast out into the Analog world.

The book explores the perspective of a variety of loosely connected characters as they struggle to exploit, survive, or destroy this toxic meritocracy.

There is much to ponder and enjoy in this book: the limitations of forced distribution performance measurement systems; over-reliance on technology and spoon-feeding of information; the chilling ubiquity of AI in future societies. However the storylines I enjoyed the most were the human tales of loss, ambition and love.

I recognised the chilling BellCorp HR messages wrapping brutal and uncaring messages in faux concern. The ‘curve’ was also analogous to the quantification of class, with (top) 20%ers living in luxury but ever wary of sliding down the social pecking order.

At times I felt there was too much clumsy explanatory dialogue, and many of the story threads did not resolve themselves or reinforce other threads in a satisfying way. The story captured my attention with its clever (and topical) concepts, but would have benefited from a stronger central thread driving the story.

Overall an interesting thought experiment, but shy of a few characters for readers to really care about.

Apex City was formerly Bangalore, and after some unspecified disasters, has become a futuristic city where every decision is made based on mathematics, image, values and opinions. Technology is integrated into your very person, scanners, comms devices, augmented holidays and more. If you are at the high end of the Bell curve, have worked hard, proven your productivity, cultivated the right image, you can make it to the ranks of the Twenty Percent. You have all that you could desire, and more. Fail to make it, and you drop to the ranks of the Ten Percent, and risk deportation to the rank of Analog, outside of Apex City, with no electricity,running water, humanity and worse still, no technology.

The system is perfect. Until a revolution begins in the Analog world, that threatens to bring Apex city crashing to the ground.

This book is set in a future dystopian world, where image and people's perception of you is literally everything. You have to look perfect, act perfect, be perfect in order to come out on top. It features an extremely divided society, those who have everything, and those who really have nothing. Those who have it all purposely keep those without down, rather than uplifting them.

It had the potential to be a really great read, with the world created being very unique and complex. However the approach was somewhat disjointed and left you struggling to engage. The method used, a series of characters, each telling their own story to build up the world could have worked, but it fragmented things a bit too much, and instead left us with no key character to resonate with. Some of the stories and snippets of the world we see are really engaging and you want more, and then suddenly it cuts off to the next. Other stories leave you confused, as you don’t know who the protagonist is, what they are up to, and why we should care.
Overall it is an interesting read which had potential, and I am glad to have read it, but not one which had me on the edge of my seat.

*I received this copy from NetGalley for review but all opinions are my own.

A scathing look at the near future that is at once both bitingly funny and heartbreakingly sad. I loved it, especially the anthology-like approach that really gave a thorough view of Apex City and it’s inhabitants, with different stories bringing out different aspects of Bell and Analog society that may have been lost in a more traditional telling. Highly recommended.

First of all, I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free copy of the book in return for an honest review.

I also must admit that I did not finish this book, and you can disregard my review if you to on that basis.

The book is a collection of short stories describing reality in Apex city, which was created when Bangalore was split into two - one occupied by the "digital" haves and the other - by the "analogue" have nots. If this reminds you of the story behind the 2013 film Oblivion, then it's not just me. Also reminds me a bit of the Diamond Age, by Stephenson. Echoes of Arcane (the Netflix series) are also abound. I'm probably missing dozens more.

Regardless, I found this to be a hard read. At its core, the universe the author creates is not interesting or innovative. It's not thrilling. It's just meh. Jeffery Thomas, who also created a universe and described it via a series of short stories, was mesmerising. There were deep and thoughtful topics covered, and the universe was rich, nuanced, and innovative.

I also disliked the stories themselves. The writing felt pretentious and uninvolved. As if the author thought they were better than they actually are. Feels like not enough effort went into the characters, the why of things, etc.

While the fact that the setting is in India is marginally interesting, it is not enough to carry the stories, and not at all lives up to its full potential.

I'd skip.

A brilliant futuristic read. Thank you to the publisher for the ARC, I really enjoyed reading it. I look forward to more books from the author in the future

I haven’t read a Sci-Fi book for some time and was looking forward to a change from my usual thrillers and murder mysteries. However, this was a disappointing read for me. I found the story very disjointed and the characters difficult to follow through the narrative which led to an obvious conclusion.

I love books set in dystopian worlds and liked the setting for this one in a would where social media status is everything leading to a divided society of haves and have nots
The book is rather disjointed and reads more like a collection of interesting stories than a cohesive whole .Some of the stories have great ideas behind them ,I liked the section where language was entirely replaced by emojis and the written language totally disappears in stages until it becomes clear that peoples names need to be written to identify them .Another story I enjoyed was the brain IT link which ends up influencing a persons behaviour to better fit them for the social media world
Although I did enjoy the concepts I found that the author spends so much time explaining these complex ideas that they don’t concentrate enough on the story of the people behind these ideas or those influenced by them .To really enjoy a book I need more character development and felt that this book didn’t give me all I needed. I would have loved to have been introduced to the human characters in more detail so that I feel invested in what happens to them next
I’m summary this is a complex sci fi novel which for me failed to introduce sufficient human interest to keep me enthralled
I read an early copy on NetGalley Uk the book is published in the Uk by Rebellion Publishing in March 2023

sadly not for me this book, though some may love it i found it never got into a flow and i never got fully invested.
very imaginative though and well written but for me not an easy read

I have mixed feelings about this book. It was clearly very well written and imaginative, but the story itself was so fractured that it was a struggle to get invested. Other readers might find it more appealing, but with a lot of new SF I am seeing a trend of increasingly splintered narratives - something that maybe attempts to paint a much bigger picture of a world - and it often comes at the expense of narrative propulsion.

The ‘ten percentage thief’ was an interesting story about a dystopian future where humans are completely reliant on technology to prove their place in society. If they are not worth it then they don’t get any technology..
Although it is an interesting concept I found it difficult to really love the book as their is no character development. There is no one to feel emotionally involved with. It is a collection of many different viewpoints. Not really my cup of tea but I’m glad I read it.

The numerous individual character vignettes woven together to form this novel are absolutely wonderful. Lavanya Lakshminarayan's writing is futuristic and imaginative, yet highly accessible. Although the overall arc of the story is perhaps somewhat lightweight, compared to the quality of the individual character narratives, the book remains an engaging and thoroughly absorbing read. The future world created in "The Ten Percent Thief" seems to me highly realistic, being both simultaneously dystopian yet not too far removed from our current trajectory. Definitely recommended. A special thank you to Rebellion Publishing and NetGalley for a no obligation advance review copy.

You're either productive or culled. The future Bangalore, renamed Apex City, isn't an easy place to thrive. What counts is productivity, virality or Engager-to-Lurkers ratio.

Ten Percent Thief is structured as a collection of interconnected short stories with recurring characters. The stories build on each other and lead to an interesting culmination. Consequently, there's no distinct plot or central character to root for. In my opinion, Ten Percent Thef sacrifices character development and plot in favor of ideas and dark satire. Each story shows a different facet of society and leads to an intense climax.

Let's take a look at life in the Apex City. The Bell Corporation has established a "meritocratic technarchy." It determines how people should live. The "Virtuals" live in the virtual world and despise the "Analogs" forced to live in a world that's succumbed to climate change, where there's almost no fresh food or water and no technology. The society is literally split into two and divided by electric shield known as a Carnatic Meridian.

Sounds harsh? It is, but the "Virtuals" don't have it easy, either. Their productivity metrics are constantly being recalculated, and it's easy to slide down the ladder. And if you slip, you can be harvested or turned into an Analog.

By telling the story through interconnected short stories, Lakshmirayan is able to present multiple perspectives of the citizens of Apex City and show readers how the revolution begins and develops. While the narrative is complex, the storyline is quite simple. A subgroup of the Analogs are planning revolution to gain equal rights, and equal access to the technology. Nothing new here. The way of telling it, though, is new.

Lakshminarayan's world-building is detailed and technology-oriented. She's created a world where productivity is the only thing that counts and citizens receive benefits according to their calculated value to society. The narrative allows readers to see every aspect of the world from different perspectives (Bell Corp executives, employees, adopted analog musicians, tour guides, and more). It's an interesting, kaleidoscopic journey.

I appreciate the concise and intelligent writing style. Ten Percent Thief does everything right if you're here for the ideas and world building. However, if you're looking for good science, I'm not convinced it's here. If you're looking for emotional characters' arcs, some stories have them, but overall the book lacks an emotional core or central characters to sympathize with.

All in all, I have mixed feelings about Ten Percent Thief. It's certainly an interesting read, but not one I was emotionally invested in. There's nothing wrong with intellectual stories, but I'm not sure the science here would stand up to scrutiny. I think it's more of an interesting look at how technology and social media can corrupt and dehumanize people. Don't get me wrong. I'm glad I read Ten Percent Thief. I simply feel it sacrifices parts that are subjectively important to me (characters, plot) in favor of ideas and themes.