Lend with Amazon Prime, one book free per month, this is for January 2015.
While the ending is a bit too clean and cozy, this is a top-notch read.
In the tradition of [a:Cory Doctorow|12581|Cory Doctorow|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1361468756p2/12581.jpg]'s [b:Little Brother|12361354|Little Brother|Cory Doctorow|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/book/50x75-4845f44723bc5d3a9ac322f99b110b1d.png|939584] and [b:Homeland|12917338|Homeland (Little Brother, #2)|Cory Doctorow|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1340259004s/12917338.jpg|18072409], this is set in a not too distant future, and focuses mainly on the influence the advance of 3d-printing will have, while in the grip of big corporations, even with rampant copying of designs and information somehow restricted in the internet of the USA. While not all is too realistic, due to the focus of one (later two) game changing invention, it is gripping and fast paced.
The main heroine is a good person and I really like her. Little time for romance, and sex only hinted at late in the book.
For me this is a clear 5star, and although it lacks the depth of books of [a:Daniel Suarez|1956402|Daniel Suarez|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1265394868p2/1956402.jpg], fans of that author and of Doctorow should check it out.
And I would really like to see this filmed. As this is neatly concluded, no trilogy or sequel in sight (would pick that up instantly, though).
Highly recommended near future SF. ( )

I was given this book in exchange for an honest review.

This was a fast-paced read - I couldn't turn the pages fast enough. I loved the heroine being a strong independent female. It was a great book with a flawless storyline and well developed characters. Can't wait to read more from this author! ( )

4 stars *light-spoilers*

A fun, fast-paced read that pulled me right in. The story centers around a young teen/woman named Carmen who has master-minded an invention (solid hologram gloves that she calls 'Lux' when she needs to use them, manifesting the tools at her command, which I loved and thought was totally bad-ass, btw) that threatens the powers-that-be and finds herself on the run to survive. Along the way, she ignites a revolution.

Two things would make this story even better:

1) I thought that the story could use more world-building and development and that too much of the basis was founded on the basis of humankind's dependence on one technical product (3D printer). For me, sci-fi has to pass the 'plausibility' & 'believe-ability' factors for my interest to truly be pulled in.

2) And, although I enjoyed the heroine's adventure, I struggled to believe the voice was that of a woman or young woman or a teenage girl. I just kept hearing a sixteen year-old guy? The voice wasn't feminine to me. ( )

A Superhero Straight out of the Occupy Movement

(Full disclosure: I received a free electronic copy of this book for review through Library Thing's Member Giveaway program. Also, minor spoilers below.)

Sixteen-year-old Carmen Reyes Zhao should have been on top of the world. Not a year out of college and just two months after being canned from her lucrative engineering job at 3D printer megacorp Cygnus, Carmen invented something big. Like change-the-world big. Instead of stumbling all over themselves to rehire Carmen, her former bosses are chasing her down. Carmen not only unwittingly violated the Corporate Espionage Act by continuing her research after she was fired from Cygnus - but her invention is so revolutionary that it poses a serious threat to Cygnus's monopoly on, well, everything.

In Ultraviolet, Lewis imagines a dystopia that's so chilling precisely because it feels so real and believable - so terribly possible. The advent of 3D printers led to 30% unemployment in just a few years. Since most people can manufacture their own goods at the push of a printer button, the bulk of blue collar jobs are in garbage and recycling for the feedstock industries - dirty and dangerous work. High school ends early so that kids can go to work at fifteen. Only a "lucky" few teenagers attend college, and those who do don't waste time on "frivolous" subjects like humanities and the social sciences. The turnaround time on an engineer? Six months.

Unsurprisingly, the American government has been bought and paid for by a handful of uber-rich corporations, which craft laws and shape morality to protect their own selfish interests (money, power, market shares). Businesses like Cygnus have a vested interest in keeping people poor, uneducated, and dependent on their products. When Carmen figures out how to turn light (a free resource, as opposed to Cygnus's expensive feedstock) into physical objects, Cygnus claims ownership of her hologram projection suit so that it can bury the tech - and Carmen, in a federal prison. Luckily, she's got an entire armory at her fingertips. Literally. (My favorite is the over-the-top sword and armor based on designs from a video game, Gyroware's Demon Age 3. Lewis has an uncanny sense of pop culture trends, which makes Ultraviolet all the more fun.)

Overnight, Carmen joins the ranks of other criminal scientists. We meet Felix, another ex-Cygnus employee who discovered a new, less expensive kind of aluminum, and was swiftly fired for his ambition, as well as the mythical Dean, who created his own game changer, a recycling machine that spits out feedstock for free. Too bad Carmen and her peers were unlucky enough to be born into a country where inventing tools to help the starving masses lift themselves out of poverty is frowned upon, rather than lauded. (Spoiler alert: in this world, it's America that's backwards. Everyone else already has access to organic printers that make food out of dirt and grass, and has had for four years.) With a little help from Felix and her growing fan base, Carmen sets out to take on not just Cygnus, but the system itself.

Exciting, original, and fast-paced, Ultraviolet is a highly enjoyable read - and one with a distinctly anti-capitalist bent. It's hard to watch more than just a few minutes of Fox News - the utter contempt for the working poor, the defense of corporate welfare, and the demands to treat corporations as people, except when it comes to punishing them for criminal activity - and not think of Cygnus and its ilk. When Carmen and Felix set up camp in an abandoned Baltimore suburb, the Occupy Our Homes movement sprang to mind. Millions of people eking out a miserable existence while the one percent gets rich and then richer and then obscenely, unfathomably rich. Ultraviolet is the best kind of science fiction - one that challenges existing power structures and entreats the reader to imagine a different way of life.

And oh, how it turns American nationalism on its head! Presumably at the megacorps' request, the American government has closed the internet, thus blocking citizen access to potentially revolutionary information: Carmen's hologram projector, Dean's recycler, and the much-coveted food printer. Whereas citizens from Canada ("I hear the Mounties shoot Yankees on sight now") to Nigeria are independent and self-sufficient, acquiescence to corporate demands have all but ruined America. Yup, we're still exceptional in this 'verse - but here, American exceptionalism is a mark of shame.

Ultraviolet features a remarkably diverse cast. Carmen was born to a Chinese American father and a Latina mother; while she speaks Spanish, her inability to pick up Cantonese from dad is commented upon in passing. Best friend Mercedes ("Mercy") Ortiz is also Latina, and Felix may be read as Latino as well. (His last name is James, but he's described as having thick, curly black hair.) This doesn't seem like a lot, but the main cast of characters is rather small: Carmen, Felix, Agent Frost, Brian, Mercedes, and Dom.

In the "About the Author" page, Lewis says that he "likes writing about heroines that his daughters can respect and admire, characters who blaze their own paths with bright minds and unbreakable spirits." (Parenting, you're doing it right!) In Carmen and Ultraviolet, Lewis has most definitely succeeded. Carmen is a complex and realistic character. She's flawed, doesn't always look before she leaps, and at least initially is content to play the game in order to ensure the safety of her friends and family. Over the course of the story Carmen grows and matures; she begins to imagine a brighter future not just for her and her own, but for all of humanity. Though she's willing to fight the powers that be, she's plagued by self-doubt: is it possible to fight monsters without becoming a monster yourself?

There's even an especially awesome scene wherein Carmen bests would-be street harassers with her giant ultraviolet sword. Can I get a Hollaback! Baltimore?

The romance between Carmen and Felix is a bit awkward, but in a good way. A realistic and believable way. I hope those crazy kids make it. (The sexy scenes are a PG-13 at most. Pretty tame stuff. Ditto the violence, which frequently veers towards the cartoonish.)

I even love the chapter titles, which are mostly based on industry terms and marketing lingo ("Acquisitions," "Cold Calling," "Early Adopters"). They give little of the plot away yet still manage to impart a sense of story progression.

On the downside, I did find several editing errors (mostly the wrong tense), but nothing egregious. There are also a few plot holes - Isn't Cygnus able to track Carmen's debit card? What about Felix's stolen ID badge? And is any company dumb enough to house all its data in one place, without any off-site backups? - but nothing I wasn't willing and able to overlook. The optimistic, even utopian ending is probably the single most unrealistic part of the story. Still, it fits. Anything else would have felt wrong.

Ultraviolet is my first Joseph Robert Lewis book, but it won't be my last. The dude can write, and I am a sucker for science fiction and fantasy featuring kickass heroines.

First line: "It's easy to remember the day when my whole life changed because that's the day people started shooting at me."

Favorite line: "Africa is not a country, people."

Tearjerkiest line: "This is a new world."

http://www.easyvegan.info/2014/03/26/ultraviolet-by-joseph-robert-lewis/ ( )

[Ultraviolet] by [Joseph Robert Lewis] was a fun fast paced read. The main character Carmen is a very independent young woman who just wants to make a better life for her and her parents. She has played by the rules but apparently the rules change to benefit the rich corporations.

She becomes a heroine to many people when she decides to fight back but also puts those she cares about in danger. With the help of another victim of the corporate greed she works to make a change for those she cares about.

The questions that Carmen struggles with about where is the line between vigilante and terrorist adds a very humanistic twist to this story. I also love to see strong women protagonists. For too long girls were always the weak and helpless in need of rescue. I am glad to see that changing. ( )