This book was not for me. Is it YA or just written that way? Also, the different perspectives didn’t add anything to the story.

Thanks NETGALLEY for the ARC

This book has a good premise, and parts of it are quite good, but it doesn't quite gel into a coherent whole.

The basic idea here is that a megacoroporation figures out a way to upload people's minds into computers upon death, and those minds are then put into robot bodies (of varying quality depending on how much one is willing to pay). Consciousness remains. Sounds great, right? Except that the "people" are regarded as the intellectual property of the megacorp, and are leased to living caretakers. Their mental capacity is controlled by their processing speed, and the bodies range from trash cans on wheels to full replicants. None of whom have any rights or any more legal status than a piece of software.

Where this all goes is fairly predictable. The main storyline follows one person who is able to throw off the programmed command restraints on her and go off on her own. Topics addressed, to varying degrees, include hardware problems, imperfect data transfers, what it is like to be a conscious mind WITHOUT a body, what stops the megacorp from uploading a copy of a mind of someone who's NOT dead (absolutely nothing), what stops them from copying the mind of someone who's been uploaded (again, absolutely nothing).

But there's also a plague and massive quarantine that seems completely irrelevant, and all sorts of side characters that get introduced and never explored. Like I said, parts of it were good, but on the whole it just didn't add up to anything special.

I've said it before, but I think more authors need to try not writing a novel so much as a series of vignettes. When I stopped trying to follow the central storyline, and treated this book as a series episodes devoid of context, it worked better.

Thank you to Net Galley for providing me with an e-book copy. The premise of this book is so good. I was very excited to read it and I picked it up as soon as I got it. The book to me is fairly short and I feel like in this world it's hard to pull it off in 272 pages. There were quite a bit of characters and different perspective but hardly enough character development. I wasn't invested in most of the characters. The middle part of the book was a bit slow. And I do think it needed a bit more world building. Overall for a debut novel this wasn't bad. I do think the author has a lot of potential and the cover is great. I enjoyed it enough to finish the book and I'd give it a 3 star.

This was……odd?
The premise was great - a virus wipes out most of the population and the remaining survivors now have to live inside. Technology has advanced so much that it is possible to upload the consciousness of the dead into a "companion" that you can either spend loads of money on to make human-like (think along the lines of skin, hair, etc) or you can just leave in a computer screen.
We first meet Lilac, who is a companion for a mother and daughter duo but from herein things got really weird. So much happens and there are so many characters that it was hard to keep track of who was who and what was actually going on. The chapters were super long, which meant it just seemed to drag and came across as a chore to read. There was very little story or world-building - nothing was really mentioned about the initial events of the virus or who developed the companions, which lead to me struggling to see the relevance of the virus to the overall story. Some of the sex scenes were a bit random and I got so confused at one point as someone was hunting a polar bear?!
I do love the cover though, probably one of the nicer ones I've seen in a while!

Overall, I thought it was a fantastic premise but very poor execution. It seemed like the author had loads of great ideas that they wanted to include and, instead of only including a few, just included them all regardless of whether they were relevant or not. Unfortunately, I would not recommend this to other readers.

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for sending me a copy of this book in return for an honest review.

This book drew me in right away and I read it all within 24 hours. The author creates the characters in such a way that you’re immediately attached to them and want to know what happens to them next. This book was riveting, novel, frightening, and understandable. So glad I came across it.

2.5 stars.
The premise as written on the back of the book sounded really cool but the execution fell short. The idea of downloading consciousness and that consciousness being Proprietary Information of a corporation is interesting and terrifying. I found the jumping from one person's (or companion's) perspective to another to be somewhat confusing, and I had to keep flipping back and forth to remind myself who various characters were. Additionally, there were long time lapses between some of the chapters without really filling in many of the gaps or events. That was disappointing. I would have liked it to be a longer book with more detail. And the end was sort of cut off. It felt incomplete in a lot of ways.

I love fantasy/ sci-fi novels....this particular one not so much. The description sounded entertaining but the book just dragged for me.

I don't love sci-fi. I'm not wild about poorly drawn, outlandish situations superimposed on reality to force a thin moral conundrum.

This, however, was the opposite - an actual novel with intricate structure, involved characters and, well, yes, a little AI.

From the description I thought I would love this but it was a rough read. I think it was a very good idea and that it just needed a lot more working, it read a bit like an outline/rough draft. I will definitely keep an eye out for future works by this author though.

I have been trying lots of fantasy reads lately, but sometimes the world building just takes too long for me to stay interested. Did not finish.

I am not sure what it was, but I didn't really like the writing with this title. I'm not sure why, but I just didn't connect with it, despite the fascinating premise. We will still be buying a copy for the library, though. Thank you for the advanced read.

A dystopian look at what it means to be human, The Companions follows Lilac, a companion - a human being who's consciousness has been transferred into a robotic body. When questions as to the real reason behind Lilac's death emerge, she must confront the past whilst trying to survive in her current state. Spanning decades, the novel follows the evolution of the companion model and the classism that results from that evolution. Overall, I enjoyed the novel, even if the storyline got a bit muddled with the broad scope of the novel. With sympathetic characters and a unique look at the future, The Companions is a novel I'll be thinking about for some time!

A special thank you to Netgalley for providing me with a free advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

Great description for a somewhat inferior book. This was not engaging for me. It seemed "flat" in several ways. Probably an inexperienced author who just needs more experience. Hope she keeps writing.

I really appreciate the advanced copy for review!!

The description of this book is right up my alley -- dystopian with a touch of medical ethics. I love the premise, especially the idea that consciousness can be uploaded into machines and take on lifelike humanoid forms. This is rich for interesting storytelling. Unfortunately, I think the execution fell flat. Though Flynn has a knack for realistic dialogue, it seems there was a lot missing from the plot. The quarantine piqued my interest but I never got enough information to make it seem like a worthwhile component of the story. While I typically enjoy reading from multiple points of view, there were too many to keep straight and many were underdeveloped. I wanted to spend more time with Lilac, Gabe, and Kit especially. There was much to appreciate in this novel but I finished the book feeling let down.

Reading the synopsis, this book sounds interesting, but the writing wasn't at all what I expected. I guess I'm just used to normal storylines with one or two main protagonists, but this book is more like a timeline where life keeps going on and the main plot isn't just centered around one person. You get bits and pieces of perspective over gaps in time from multiple sources, so it almost feels like you're the omniscient presence witnessing what transpires over time with the entities known as companions. It's a futurish version of the world and while I enjoyed it, the multiple spaced over time perspectives leaves gaps and questions that took away from my otherwise enjoyment reading the book.

This book is set in the future where when people die, they can have their consciousness uploaded into various forms of "companions" depending on the price that is paid. They are considered a new class of people but without any human rights and are thought not to have free will. Lilac our main character is one of them who figures out she can defy commands and starts on a journey to uncover her murderer. This sparks a chain of events told by many different characters throughout the world. It was an interesting book though it was a bit of a slow read and felt all over the place at times. Worth reading but it would not have been at the top of my TBR pile.

I could not get into this book, and didn’t care for the style of writing. Reading the preview, the plot sounded interesting and unique, but the writing did not pull it off.

Set in the future on the west coast of the United States, Companions have been created and leased into the mass market. Companions are machines that are given human consciousness - the human consciousness of a formerly living person. The Companions vary in quality, some being a little more than a tin can and others looking and seeming human to the untrained eye. They are “command driven” and allegedly have safeguards in place to limit their abilities and keep them from rebelling or harming their human hosts.

At the same time we meet Lilac, a companion, we learn that California is in a state of quarantine. Scientists developed and unleashed a series of unnamed viruses that have wreaked havoc on the human race and terrified the remaining people.

Because companions are created from human consciousness, many of the companions can remember their own deaths. Lilac is one such companion and she knows she was murdered. Defying her programming, Lilac travels the coast to find and confront her murderer.

The novel spans years - toward the end of the quarantine to a decade later. We see how the companions shift from a commodity to something the wealthy choose to do to themselves in order to stay “young” forever.

We’re introduced to many characters, many companions in many forms, and many storylines. Most feel overall forgettable and only briefly seem to intersect with the others but perhaps this was intentional to create more of a manufactured, machine feel.

Overall, I found the premise incredibly intriguing. I’ve never read anything like this and I can envision it becoming a future Black Mirror episode. However, for much of the novel I felt confused by the author’s vagueness, over abundance of characters introduced way too late, and the numerous, undeveloped storylines.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me this ARC of The Companions by Katie M. Flynn.

In a world where a virus reeks havoc on society, forcing people inside, boredom and loneliness are combated by what is called "The Companion program." The idea is that people who have passed away can have their personality downloaded and put into whatever machine is afforded to them. The lucky (and wealthy) get to keep loved ones as their companions, but the less fortunate are rented out to homes, often treated poorly and subjected to abuse and boredom. One such companion, after escaping her unkind home, seeks out the woman who, long ago, was responsible for killing her. This sets of a whole chain of events.

I just could not get into this. It was way too all over the place for me, and the story was a bit weak. I needed to be invested in the characters a lot quicker, and instead I felt like I was bombarded with way too many people to keep track of, and way more info than I needed.

Sadly this book just wasn't for me; both the characters and the overall plot felt mundane and uninteresting, whilst the story seemed to just drag on and on.