Halfway Through Book Review: Automatic Noodle

Series note: In Halfway Through Book Review, I attempt to give a peek into my in-progress books past the point of no return (no DNFs here), while hopefully avoiding the inevitable spoilers of a complete read.

I’m one book in, and I’ve already futzed with the premise of this series. According to my StoryGraph, I’m already 81% of the way through this one.

But I can’t help that it’s a quick read at only 163 pages and just too much fun to put down!

Sara (my wife) gave me this one for our version of Jólabókaflóð, an Icelandic Christmas Eve tradition that we’ve started incorporating in our own holiday rituals.

I was initially interested in Annalee Newitz’s latest because I’m planning a future class about foodways, visual culture, and transit, and I always try to incorporate fiction into my classes. A vividly descriptive novella about the trials and triumphs of robots running a takeout-only ramen joint seemed like the perfect fit.

I thought it would be good and even fun. I didn’t expect it to have me returning to questions of non-human sentience (questions I’ve probed when flirting with vegetarianism and through some of my academic work).

And, as an admitted AI-hater, I couldn’t imagine I’d find myself feeling so profoundly sorry for the robot protagonists. (Before anyone ats me, I recognize that generative artificial intelligence and robots are not exactly the same.) After years of individual strife, the crew finds their joint venture succeeding only to be challenged by the review bombs of the “robophobic” Vigilance Committee.

It’s not clear yet how the story will resolve nor what, if any, bigger lesson I might take from it. I feel pretty confident I’m not suddenly going to love the proliferation of generative AI tools being foisted upon us by tech companies. However, I do suspect I’ll close Automatic Noodle still rooting for these proprietors and for humble dreamers everywhere.