The Affinities

By: Robert Charles Wilson

Narrated by: Scott Brick

In our rapidly-changing world of "social media", everyday people are more and more able to sort themselves into social groups based on finer and finer criteria. In the near future of Robert Charles Wilson's The Affinities, this process is supercharged by new analytic technologies - genetic, brain-mapping, behavioral.

To join one of the 22 Affinities is to change one's life. It's like family, and more than family. Your fellow members aren't just like you, and they aren't just people who are likely to like you. They're also the people with whom you can best cooperate in all areas of life - creative, interpersonal, even financial. At loose ends both professional and personal, young Adam Fisk takes the suite of tests to see if he qualifies for any of the Affinities, and finds that he's a match for one of the largest, the one called Tau. It's utopian - at first.

Problems in all areas of his life begin to simply sort themselves out, as he becomes part of a global network of people dedicated to helping one another - to helping him. But as the differing Affinities put their new powers to the test, they begin to rapidly chip away at the power of governments, of global corporations, of all the institutions of the old world. Then, with dreadful inevitability, the different Affinities begin to go to war - with one another. What happens next will change Adam, and his world, forever.

©2015 Robert Charles Wilson (P)2015 Macmillan Audio

A typical Robert Charles Wilson story - no spoiler

This is a typical Robert Charles Wilson story: A first person narrated story, in a world where the times are changing. Even though I've read a lot of RCW books on kindle or paperback, this is my first audio book. I have to say, the narration is spot on. Scott Brick (narrator), captures the atmosphere of RCW perfectly, and exactly as I would expect. A calm but somehow disquieting narration throughout, made me feel the same vibe, as when I read the Chronoliths for the first time.
The story itself is not really that fantastic, but I think it will make the reader stop and think about the world today a couple of times, and there is plenty of food for afterthoughts. What really makes this book, is the atmosphere and the narration together. I'm definately going to pick up another RCW book narrated by Scott.

Tribal need to belong from a modern perspective

Fascinating premise but melancholy, almost heartbreaking, ending. This near future, soft SF book plays upon the realities of modern-day social networking and projects a time when tests can group people into affinity groups where you will find like-minded people with whom you are neurologically predisposed to mesh well with. The book takes that deeply human need to belong and spools it out with technology and how sorting people could simultaneously be a boon and be a wedge between those new groups and the rest of humanity. Exploring what it would feel like to find you have no affinity, what it would feel like to be expelled from your affinity group. It takes our tribal roots and brings it to the 21st century. Recommended.

slow but mostly bearable

It wasn't completely terrible...but it wasn't my favorite story either. The concept of the Affinities is insteresting but the story dragged on and on. I kept expecting more out of the story but it never materialized. When the end finally arrived I was glad the story was finished.

there's always unseen consequences

I liked it, characters were we'll developed and just enough mysteries to keep entertained. How trusting is real family?
this is a good read. I hope you ienjoy

Originality: What Makes RCW's Works Stand Apart.

I loved this book. It's quite a trick to write something that is

1) Populated with characters who feel real, that we can connect to
2) Actually says something; make you think
3) Is genuinely original

The way 1 & 3 are artfully combined is what I think makes Wilson's books so enjoyable. Often originality is synonymous with 'weird' and hard to relate to. Not so The Affinities. The concepts of the novel are borne of a substrate made up of solid characters; indeed you could almost lose the science fiction aspect and still have a pretty decent book.

I agree with some other reviewers who have said that The Affinities could've been a bit longer. That's true, but the "fill in your own blanks" feeling one may be left with at book's end is I think even better. The reader is forced to think; in my case, not so much along the lines of "what happened next?" No, nothing like that. I was left in a place of newness; considering ideas new to me, some clear, others half formed, nicely coloured with an emotional aspect, also with its own unique flavour.

That, in my opinion, is science fiction gold.