• The Circle

  • By: Dave Eggers
  • Narrated by: Dion Graham
  • Length: 13 hrs and 42 mins
  • 3.8 out of 5 stars (9,318 ratings)

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The Circle  By  cover art

The Circle

By: Dave Eggers
Narrated by: Dion Graham
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Publisher's summary

A bestselling dystopian novel that tackles surveillance, privacy and the frightening intrusions of technology in our lives—a “compulsively readable parable for the 21st century” (Vanity Fair).

When Mae Holland is hired to work for the Circle, the world’s most powerful internet company, she feels she’s been given the opportunity of a lifetime. The Circle, run out of a sprawling California campus, links users’ personal emails, social media, banking, and purchasing with their universal operating system, resulting in one online identity and a new age of civility and transparency.

As Mae tours the open-plan office spaces, the towering glass dining facilities, the cozy dorms for those who spend nights at work, she is thrilled with the company’s modernity and activity. There are parties that last through the night, there are famous musicians playing on the lawn, there are athletic activities and clubs and brunches, and even an aquarium of rare fish retrieved from the Marianas Trench by the CEO.

Mae can’t believe her luck, her great fortune to work for the most influential company in the world—even as life beyond the campus grows distant, even as a strange encounter with a colleague leaves her shaken, even as her role at the Circle becomes increasingly public.

What begins as the captivating story of one woman’s ambition and idealism soon becomes a heart-racing novel of suspense, raising questions about memory, history, privacy, democracy, and the limits of human knowledge.

©2013 Dave Eggers (P)2013 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“A vivid, roaring dissent to the companies that have coaxed us to disgorge every thought and action onto the Web . . . Carries the potential to change how the world views its addicted, compliant thrall to all things digital. If you work in Silicon Valley, or just care about what goes on there, you need to pay attention.” (Dennis K. Berman, The Wall Street Journal)

“The particular charm and power of Eggers’s book . . . could be described as ‘topical’ or ‘timely,’ though those pedestrian words do not nearly capture its imaginative vision . . . Simply a great story, with a fascinating protagonist, sharply drawn supporting characters and an exciting, unpredictable plot . . . As scary as the story’s implications will be to some readers, the reading experience is pure pleasure.” (Hugo Lindgren, The New York Times Magazine)

What listeners say about The Circle

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
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    2,978
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  • 2 Stars
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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

A solid, just not great social network dystopia

(***1/2) A solid, just not great social network dystopia. Imagine FB::Google::Amazon take over the world. There is nowhere left to hide. No secrets. No privacy. No down time. In fact, "SECRETS ARE LIES, SHARING IS CARING, PRIVACY IS THEFT." While it is interesting, and does seem to mimic some of the warnings of Brave New World, 1984, Neuromancer and even elements of Ghostwritten. In the end, it just isn't Eggers' best work. It is at once more superficial, more clean, more predictable than I would have liked.

Don't get me wrong, I think Eggers is a genius. I think he has an amazing energy and impeccable timing. He seems to deliver a novel or book at almost exactly the perfect moment for publication. He is a perfect zeitgeist surfer. He catches the waves easily and almost seems to ride every wave of the literary ocean. Impossible? I know, but his production is large, his interests varied, his fingerprints are everywhere.

I guess the problem is (for me) that Dave Eggers is almost the exact opposite of Mark Twain. Mark Twain failed twice at both printing and publishing, but wrote amazing and important works. I think Eggers (with his McSweeney's success, his amazing ability to adapt, his tendency to swim with the currents, to be infinitely relevant, completely likable) is able to do almost everything ... except make me completely love his writing or get drunk off his prose. I always finish his novels/books neither surprised, awed or completely fed. I just feel the need to go read something else, something with heft that isn't looking to the future or the past, left or right, and actually doesn't really give a flying-F if you 'LIKE' it.

Dion Graham delivers the goods with the narration. He doesn't get in front of the novel but is able to tease out the characters while not making himself the center of the action.

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83 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Terrifying look at a techno-destruction of privacy

[NOTE: Mild spoilers below.]

A terrifying look into a future where companies like Google and Facebook leverage the power of Big Data to obliterate privacy and track every minute aspect of our lives. The Circle is quite obviously a fictionalized portrayal of largely Google but with aspects of Facebook and Twitter thrown in. The ability of the company in the novel to destroy privacy and position itself to establish totalitarian control of our future is a bit of a stretch but not as much as you might think. The novel also gives a glimpse into the naivete of the millenials and other young people whose "progressive" thinking on information, collectivism and social interaction empower this risk to all of our privacy. The term used late in the book - infocommunism - perfectly summarizes the result of this dangerous lurch toward tracking, recording, monitoring, datafying and analyzing all aspects of our lives.

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45 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Excellent... but!

I loved this book, the story line and the characters. The whole idea of something like this happening is here. Why didn't I give it a 5 for overall? I would have loved to see what happened after? Because it just ended..It left me going, what what? Is he writing another book? It - Just - Ended! LOL!

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40 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Teaser Book--Excellent! Unabridged Book--Meh!

I always like to see what's free, and I found the teaser of this book to be one that intrigued me. I bought the book immediately. The author challenges the view of pundits who, during the time of "George Dub's" presidency, touted that if you do not support his him, you are disloyal to the country. Imagine that Amazon, Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft all came together as one company and systematically removes free will, gets rid of politicians who challenge it, and sells things in a way that everyone can pressure you to do it too. Eventually, everyone has to register and must vote.

Imagine that every public official had to go wear a camera every day to show their constituents that they were honest? Imagine that every child has a tag embedded in their body so they could never be stolen again? Much of this seems great, but the key factor is that at some point their is no privacy and everyone must become transparent. In fact, PRIVACY IS THEFT and SECRETS ARE LIES."

Do you remember the Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures? If not, please search for it because throughout the story, If you are smart, you can see where this is going. 1984--George Orwell or The Traveler--John Twelve Hawks(Highly recommend).

A woman named Mae, is the main heroine. Mae is a buddy of one of the top people in the company "Circle", and is grateful to have a job that her friend obtained for Mae. The Circle even pays for the treatment of Mae's father, which gains her loyalty. Mae starts out with two computer screens at her desk. Mae has many opportunities to exercise her moral fiber and falls short every time. I rooted for Mae, but found her to be unsympathetic, consistently foolish, and swayed too much by what others thought of her. Eventually she turned into a vain, selfish, superficial person. The only time I really liked her was when she was a criminal for a night( Read the book if you want to know). She rejects the teachings of her parents for those of a company. Mae is a foolish woman who gives up her identity, privacy, and happiness for a larger dream that never quite fills the void. She continually has relations with a man who not only does not suit her, but also fails to make love to her properly or "finish" with her. I found myself frustrated with her because at 24, I was not that stupid or simple. My mom would have told me to dump him and dump him quick! By the end of the book, she has seven monitors, a camera and headphones so that people can see everything she does.

I think Edgers wanted this to be a satirical story steered by the questions "When does free will of a Utopia cross the line? Is it worth it to give up our rights and freedoms for the appearance of security? "Should their be a limit?" It's supposed to be satire, but I am not sure it meets that billing. The Circle is not Mr. Eggers' best novels. However, the questions it raise should make this novel a must read for teens and young adults.

If you buy the book, you will understand the "Meh" in my title. If you don't, you saved a credit. I have tried to a good review of a new novel so I hope this helps you decide whether or not to purchace. However, you have free will to decide on your own....don't you? ;)

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39 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Never closes the loop...

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Only for Facebook fanatics to tell them to back off...

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

Make it go somewhere unexpected...this was really an extended short story...with a long lead up and went nowhere.

What about Dion Graham’s performance did you like?

Initially the voice gravitas reminded me of "In A World" which I had just seen and it was distracting but after awhile it didn't bug me.

Did The Circle inspire you to do anything?

Appreciate Dave Eggars early books more... when he had something to say.

Any additional comments?

I guess my expectations for Mr. Eggars was higher to approach the "societal dive into globalization of personal experience" with a new perspective. Social media will be around a while...he should have taken the time to flesh out a more complex or at least exciting story line.

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27 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Whoa!

This book was AMAZING, but terrifying. Dave Eggers (who I have previously not loved) presents a view of America not unlike a 1984/Brave New World; however, rather than imagining some distant future dystopia, he is referring to a world we can all realistically foresee in 2-4 years, given the proliferation of social media and the digital age. In this world, we interact via "zings" and "smiles," travel by going to a live stream of a faraway beach, and can watch our neighbors, politicians, and strangers' ever moves via cameras in the environments or on their persons. As an accidental figurehead of the "full transparency" movement is Mae, the protagonist and employee of the culprit spearheading this new world, the Facebook/Google/Twitter/YouTube empire called "The Circle."

I have completely reversed my opinion of Mr. Eggers as a novelist. The characters in this book were well thought-out, poignant, realistic, and relatable. You completely understand how his protagonist ends up in the mind-boggling situations she does. Moreover, having Mae, the narrator, be so committed to "the cause" allows Mr. Eggers to illustrate the many potential arguments FOR a society like this, while allowing his reader to draw her own conclusions regarding the many perils. In the end, it has completely revised the way I interact with the internet and questioned my own beliefs about the existence and value of my identity, privacy, and "social" interactions.

As a narrator, Mr. Graham is terrific. This was my first audiobook in which a male voice narrated a female role; however, his delivery was spot on. He gave wonderful movement to fast-talking Annie, fully captured Mae's frustration during an especially poignant concluding scene, and brought The Circle to life.

A MUST READ!

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24 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Great premise, horrible execution

What did you like best about The Circle? What did you like least?

When I first started reading The Circle I was very intrigued by where it could have gone. However after waiting and waiting for something to happen, nothing did. The main trouble with the book is that while this is big brother on steroids, we are supposed to believe that everyone, everywhere likes everything The Circle produces. No matter how invasive their products are, people love them and want more. Not just techies, I'm talking everyone, in every age group, in every location in the world. That is just total B***S*** That said, if you want to read about some ways that companies like Google, Facebook, Twitter, Apple and the like could invade our privacy then you might want to give a listen.

Would you ever listen to anything by Dave Eggers again?

I would definitely get another book by Dave Eggers. While this book is a dud, the other I read by him "the heartbreaking work of staggering genius" was great.

What does Dion Graham bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The vocalizations really added to the feel of the book and the sense of wonder from the people actively involved in "The Circle" although it would have been better to have multiple narrators

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

It might be interesting to see the settings. They did sound interesting, if a whole lot farfetched.

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17 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

A fresh, past-paced story

As I listen to a lot of books, many of them begin to run together in my mind. I really enjoyed The Circle because it was a fresh, unique story. I know many people will compare it to Orwell's 1984, but to me there is a big difference. Orwell's book, published in 1949, described a futuristic setting 35 years down the road. In The Circle Eggers describes "futuristic" events that could happen very, very soon.

Eggers writes a fast-paced story that really pulled me in. Unlike most crime novels, where I have a pretty good sense of how things are going to end up, I eagerly listened to see where the author was taking us. I give this book two thumbs up.

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16 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Good premise but don't be sucked in, it gets dumb

What does Dion Graham bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Graham's reading is brave. He inserts a great deal more subjective interpretation than customary into not only line readings but narration as well. Many times his inflections add nuances to the text that the author may or may not have intended. I think this was the right choice though, as fortunately his instincts are usually very good, and so the performance adds a lot to the so-so writing.

Any additional comments?

If you are intrigued by the premise of this book - as I was - beware. It does not live up to the promise. It sounds like it's going to be a sweeping indictment of the digital age, but is actually a rather weak and shallow story of a single rather uninteresting character and her usually alcohol-fueled romantic relationships. Indeed Eggers presents a lot of interesting takes on the basic notion of social media and loss of privacy, but he hasn't thought his ideas through. He got in way over his head, and so the novel is mostly a big disappointment.

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14 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Good for teens

I would think that target audience for this book is somewhere in late teens, early twenties. I listened to it regardless. It’s not bad, just a bit too naive for a bit older age group. Nice narration though.

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13 people found this helpful