The Unseen World by Liz Moore (Review by Erin Woodward)
Rating: 5/5*
Like I said in my previous review of The Sound of Gravel, I rarely review books. But I seem to be on a roll and have read three AMAZING books back to back. I’ve decided I’ll only read great books – ha, if only it was that easy right?! The third book; I’m about ten pages away from completion but you’ll likely find more glowing words on here in a few days time. Stay tuned.
So – The Unseen World by Liz Moore starts out without too much fanfare and it actually continues at this pace for a good chunk of the book telling the story of single father David, a genius that runs a computer lab of folks dedicated to the progression of natural language processing ( a computer able to reply to complex questions and conversation). He’s clearly incredibly intelligent and rather eccentric and we learn he came to bore Ada at the age of 48 with a surrogate. The book goes on to detail home schooled Ada’s life and her clear distress as her father starts to decline with the onset of Alzheimer’s.
But just as you think you’ve understood the premise of the book completely and wonder if there is any point in reading the next 20o pages it veers off into a realm you most certainly didn’t see coming and most suddenly you’re wondering if anything you learned about David was ever true at all.
The New York times calls it “fiercely intelligent” and I wouldn’t disagree. It kept me hooked and turned a story that could have been a complete flop into a 2017 must read.
