This is a deconstructing of many, many aspects of modern living. Of course, as the title suggests, it focuses mainly on the Internet, and the big websites and certain social media platforms, but it touches base on many other subjects, such as the Arab spring, the last four or five US presidents and a goat which was surgically altered to be a unicorn (I had never heard of this, but it is 100% a thing that happened). It's not just the internet Kobek hates, it's gentrification, George W Bush, corporations and a whole host of other things too.
There is a story along the way - this is a novel after all and not just a recap of the last 20 years - but it gets so lost in the many, many tangents it is almost irrelevant to the point of this book. For those of you who need a plot - it is about a comic illustrator who delivers a lecture to a University class, which gets recorded and goes viral. She has to then create a twitter account to carry out some damage control. There is little more to the story of this book than the above two sentences.
That is not to say that this is a boring book, or that it is a waste of time. Almost every page has a sneering, cynical opinion on some aspect of history or online culture or modern pop culture or even just a phrase a character has used in the book. Every passage of narrative to carry on the plot is followed by 3 or 4 or 5 paragraphs to explain every idiom or reference made in the narrative. In the book Jarett explains that it is written to reflect what reading online is like, and "I Hate the Internet" reads like you are furiously zooming through a Wikipedia article, opening a new tab for every blue word and reading the first paragraph on the tab as it opens, then returning to the original article that you were slowly making progress through. This might sound dull, but this novel has such a ferocious wit, and such a pessimistic, miserable view on things that it is immensely readable, and very very quotable.
There is a huge, obvious influence on this book - almost as if this is a tribute - which is Kurt Vonnegut Jr. I know this is lazy comparison since it is right there on the front cover, but it really needs mentioning. This book is hugely reminiscent of Breakfast of Champions by Vonnegut (which I have a review drafted for, I'll get around to finishing it sometime), almost to the point where maybe it crossed over into rip-off territory. The trick of telling a bit of the story then explaining every part of it as if the reader was from another planet is exactly the same as Breakfast of Champions. For me, ultimately, this doesn't matter. I enjoyed this book, and Breakfast is 45 years old now. It's nice to have it updated.
I really enjoyed this book, and I'd give it a strong 7 out of 10. It is not, as the book repeatedly calls itself, a bad book
What do you think? Have you read this book? Do you agree or disagree? Let me know in the comments
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