Review: I Heart Robot by Suzanne van Rooyen

What: I Heart Robot by Suzanne van Rooyen

Who: Month9Books

When: March 31st 2015

How: A copy of this novel was provided by Month9Books for review.

Sixteen-year-old Tyri wants to be a musician and wants to be with someone who won’t belittle her musical aspirations.

Q-I-99 aka ‘Quinn’ lives in a scrap metal sanctuary with other rogue droids. While some use violence to make their voices heard, demanding equal rights for AI enhanced robots, Quinn just wants a moment on stage with his violin to show the humans that androids like him have more to offer than their processing power.

Tyri and Quinn’s worlds collide when they’re accepted by the Baldur Junior Philharmonic Orchestra. As the rift between robots and humans deepens, Tyri and Quinn’s love of music brings them closer together, making Tyri question where her loyalties lie and Quinn question his place in the world. With the city on the brink of civil war, Tyri and Quinn make a shocking discovery that turns their world inside out. Will their passion for music be enough to hold them together while everything else crumbles down around them, or will the truth of who they are tear them apart?

Okay, I’m going to outline my two main problems with I Heart Robot (but the second one isn’t a problem so much as a wish on my behalf):

#1

Tyri. I just couldn’t really understand her. One moment she’s completely in love with her boyfriend, and then the next she is thinking that they’re drifting apart. One moment she’s partial to the robots and agree that they shouldn’t be treated like shit, and then the next she’s being a complete bitch about them and calling them ‘tin cans’. I just cannot stand people who are like that: they have no concrete emotions of beliefs and I’m just kind of like … who even are you? Because your boyfriend is a bit of a douche, so yeah, you probably should break up with him. Because being supportive of a movement doesn’t mean you bow out when something goes wrong – one does not represent the many.

So yeah, I was not keen on Tyri and her back and forth on everything that’s important to her, even her violin.

#2

Robots shouldn’t have a predetermined sexual orientation. I mean, who the heck is really gonna put some code in saying that a male robot should be into female robots (or humans or whatever) and vice versa? Where I’m going with this is that Quinn and Kit had one thousand times the chemistry that Quinn and Tyri had, and I was finding myself thinking: wow, this book would be so much better if Tyri’s character was a guy; or if Quinn and Tyri were friends, and Quinn and Kit were lovers; or if Quinn was attracted to both of them. Because Quinn + Kit = adorable. And Kit 100% had feelings for Quinn, no doubt about it. He was always flirting and biting his lip and SPOILER they actually did kiss so there you have it END SPOILER.

Long story short: Quinn should have been bisexual because it would have made a lot of sense.

~

So those were the two things that really jumped out at me when reading I Heart Robot, and I guess they impeded quite a bit on my enjoyment of it.

But even so, I loved the concept. I remember being completely heartbroken by A.I. and Bicentennial Man, and I Heart Robot is pretty much the novelisation of those two movies. Robots/androids have feelings – they’re not just metal, they want rights because their “owners” can get pretty heinous (Quinn, darling Quinn), and Quinn is determined to show their “humanness” to the humans, in hopes to change something.

There’s a bit of a twist that I 100% saw coming, but really enjoyed nonetheless because it brought in a whole new and fresh aspect to the book.

To be honest, the ending is freaking open as heck, and I really hope there’s a sequel because I did not get the answers I was looking for. And who knows, maybe my two problems would be resolved in a sequel? *squeals happily in anticipation*

© 2015, Chiara @ Books for a Delicate Eternity. All rights reserved.