Thank you, NetGalley, for the ARC!

I liked this book way more than I thought I would. The novel is about grief and change in today’s culture of artificial intelligence and technology. Overall, I found the writing very compelling and immersive. There are so many beautiful lines! I highly recommend it.

4/5 ⭐️

Timely and thought-provoking, but a bit slow and plodding at times (even for a relatively short book). It ultimately falls a bit flat, but the questions it raises are very interesting.

In the world of UnWorld, humans have the ability to accessorize their brains with a device that stores their memories. Smooths them out. Helps them organize their thoughts. Not quite an implant, as they are externally worn, but somehow these devices grasp the human's brain and intersect with it.

Anna has a son, Alex, and a husband, Rick. Alex is 15 and a bundle of anxiety. Rick has the boundless enthusiasm and energy of a golden retriever. Both Alex and Rick feel too much, while Anna is more stoic. Anna was gifted an 'upload' by her husband for her 40th birthday. For eight years she's synced nightly with this non-human part of her brain. But when things go horribly, terribly wrong in her life, she can no longer handle having this extra voice inside her head. It has simply become too much.

This was not an easy book to read. Some of the themes are very dark and tragic. The characters are all struggling with their own issues. But that being said, it's also an amazing dive into the human psyche. Each chapter covers a point of view of one of the main characters, starting and ending with Anna. While Anna really is central to the entire story, the true center is the 'upload.' This fictional bit of hardware that almost seems to have a soul is the main character and the reason for the story to exist.

Quite creative in the sci-fi sense, this book really isn't science fiction. While the town Anna and the others inhabit is mostly run by AI, the people are just people like you and me. With the same quirks and habits. It's really very well done in the sense that you don't feel like you're going to an alternate universe.

As I said, not the easiest book to read. But worth every minute spent reading. The character development and storyline are interesting. Well thought out and well constructed. I did enjoy it.

Trigger warning: suicide and addiction


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DNF @54%

I don't like books that seem like they start mid-story with little to no explanation or set up. I also was bored by what little had happened so far.

This won't be for everyone but it is an interesting novel about grief in the time of AI. It's told from four perspectives. Aviva is the AI chip that united them. Anna's son Alex is dead and she wants answers. Samantha might have them as she was there at the cliff when he died but she's unclear as to what happened. Cathy is an AI right activist. I actually found this confusing at times but Greene has identified issues we'll have to deal with sooner rather than we might like. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Over to others.

This book felt like an interesting Black Mirror episode that couldn't stick the landing. It's a fragmented and at times, confused story but there's some intriguing concepts put forth.

The book starts with a POV from Anna, a tightly wound and resentful woman who's lost her son to potential suicide. Her section is quite good, and introduces us to the concept of "uploads", a sort of AI companion that enhances one's consciousness. Anna's section takes up a big part of the book and it's quite jarring when there's another POV and none of the other POVs hold a candle to Anna's.

Cathy's POV is really where the book loses its footing. Cathy's a college professor who teaches a class about upload personhood, and her class serves as a clunky way to world build. Her intersection into the story never quite works. There's also UnWorld, the titular video game in the novel that is sort of like a worse Minecraft. I thought the game would have more importance, but it's not really defined and only tangentially relates to the uploads.

The concepts that really work in the book is trying to work out what happened with Anna's son Alex. How everyone dismissed his pain and didn't understand the depth of his anxieties until it was too late was very touching. As I said in the beginning, the ending didn't really satisfy anything for me and Sam's POV was unnecessary. I really feel like Anna's section could have been a short story and it would have worked better.

Overall, I liked it and the descriptions of grief and anxiety were masterfully done. The hints of a bleak future overrun with AI feels timely as well.

I was excited to read this because I'm very interested in AI and how I'm afraid that it's going to take over a lot of aspects of our daily lives. I thought the concept was interesting: human beings relying on "uploads" to perform menial tasks. and the possibility that these uploads being individuals in their own right who can feel love and pain and loss. This could be an episode of The Twilight Zone or Black Mirror, two of my favorite shows!

Unfortunately, while I appreciated the concept, I didn't really connect with any of the characters with the exception of Anna, the grieving mother. Anna's chapters were compelling, but the others fell flat for me. I just didn't relate to the characters of Cathy (her point of view was most confusing to me), Sam or Aviva.

On a positive note, this was a short read and at times the language was truly beautiful.

Thanks so much to NetGalley and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor for this ARC in exchange for my review. The publication date is set for June 17, 2025.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance copy in exchange for my honest review. I thought the premise of this book with its focus on AI were timely and interesting, but the execution was a miss for me. I wish the author had focused on one, maybe two, POVs as the four different ones was just too many and they were often repetitive.

Jayson Greene does a fantastic job in writing this type of book and had that element that I was looking for from the description. I was invested in the interconnected stories and how the characters felt like they were realistic people. The plot was everything that I was looking for and glad I read this.

3.5 stars.

What an interesting concept and vehicle for thinking about grief. Divided into sections with singular points of view, UNWORLD centers on loss and grief and what it means to be human. I don't know if this is considered science fiction or speculative fiction - it is in a world with driverless cars and a way to integrate an AI "upload" into your mind. The start of the book plops the reader in the middle of a character's grief and author Jayson Greene interestingly writes about relationships with AI "uploads" and flesh and blood human beings. When does a relationship end? With death? What do memories hold and how do they play a part in our grief and peace? I wish the characters were a bit more flushed out so I could feel more invested in what they go through. That said, this debut got me thinking about my own losses and memories and that inner voice that bridges the gap between life and death. Heartfelt thanks to the publisher for the advanced copy.

I dnf'd UNWORLD. This novel was not for me. I struggled connecting to the writing and to the characters, so I stopped reading pretty early into the book.

This one just wasn’t for me. I didn’t feel connected to the story or characters. Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and author for the opportunity to read this arc.

Anna is distraught over the death of her son, Alex. She questions whether it was a suicide or an accident or something more sinister. The only way she can get answers is by talking to his best friend, Samantha, or Aviva, the AI upload of Anna. Aviva doesn't want to talk to Anna, but finds Cathy, and tells her more information to take to Anna.

This book needed more story. It felt too short and disjointed for me to care about the characters. I would have liked to know Alex on his own. I wanted more interaction with him and Samantha. Having more back story about the AI and uploads would have given more depth to the story.

Overall if you like family drama with a side of light sci-fi then check this book out. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC!

I really liked it! Beyond it being short, punchy and an easy read, I love how Greene builds out suspense by gradually revealing information rather than through action. It read like a less exciting but equally profound Black Mirror episode. Recommend for folks who enjoy more cerebral sci-fi.

Unworld by Jayson Greene is a heartbreaking look at grief in the age of technology. While a lot of stories about the future focus on big ideas or dramatic changes, this one stays very personal. It takes us inside the mind of someone who is mourning and shows how technology—something meant to help—can slowly become something more complicated.

I’ve been reading a lot about how future tech might affect our daily lives, and this story really stood out. It’s not flashy or full of action, but it makes you feel something. Greene does a great job showing how technology can blur the line between memory and reality, especially when we’re at our most vulnerable.

It’s a quiet, emotional story that sticks with you—about love, loss, and the way we try to hold on, even when we know we can’t.

fun, a little disorienting, and moves really fast. however, it promised something a bit deeper than what it gave. 4 stars. tysm for the arc.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Whoo boy I tried really hard to like this book. It had some very interesting ideas about AI (very relevant) and personhood. But the structure of the book didn't work for me, switching between different points of view the wa it did. And a dead boy is the central character tying the pieces together only he's hard to connect with.

Too often the author drops us into the middle of someone's thoughts and actions with no context and it's really jarring. Also because we spend so much time with individual characters they quickly become tiresome and unlikable. I could see where this book was going but it seemed to meander getting there.

While there are some really good elements, on the whole this didn't work for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf for this e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

I really wanted to read this one; I wanted to read it so badly, but found myself getting upset over the topic of childloss and AI and just all of it. I really struggled. I feel like the writing was absolutely phenomenal however.

Intriguing ideas, but not quite for me

Unworld presents an interesting premise with compelling themes around AI, memory, and what it means to be human. The concept of uploads was particularly intriguing, though I never felt I fully grasped how it all fit together.

Unfortunately, the execution didn’t quite land for me. The plot felt very sparse, with much of the book focused on internal monologue rather than forward momentum. While I can see how this introspective style might resonate with some readers, it left me feeling disconnected.

This book is definitely for someone—but that someone just wasn’t me.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I don’t think this book was for me. The writing style wasn’t my favorite. The prose was very confusing and detached. I couldn’t relate to any of the characters. Also too many points of view, I wanted the story to focus on one particular character. The story was very muddled and draggy. The synopsis was more moving than the actual novel.