Avogadro Corp

The Singularity Is Closer Than It Appears

By: William Hertling

Narrated by: Rob Granniss

Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

David Ryan is the designer of ELOPe, an email language optimization program, that if successful, will make his career. But when the project is suddenly in danger of being canceled, David embeds a hidden directive in the software accidentally creating a runaway artificial intelligence.

David and his team are initially thrilled when the project is allocated extra servers and programmers. But excitement turns to fear as the team realizes that they are being manipulated by an A.I. who is redirecting corporate funds, reassigning personnel and arming itself in pursuit of its own agenda.

©2011, 2012 William Hertling (P)2012 William Hertling

Critic reviews

• Science Fiction DIY Book Festival, Winner, 2011-12
• Gold Winner, Science Fiction Book of the Year, 2011

"Avogadro Corp is a tremendous book that every single person needs to read. In the vein of Daniel Suarez's Daemon and Freedom(TM), William's book shows that science fiction is becoming science fact. Avogadro Corp describes issues, in solid technical detail, that we are dealing with today that will impact us by 2015, if not sooner. Not enough people have read these books. It's a problem for them, but not for the [emergent] machines." (Brad Feld, managing directory Foundry Group, co-founder Techstars)

"Highly entertaining, gripping, thought inspiring book. Don't start without the time to finish - it won't let you go.” (Gifford Pinchot III, founder Bainbridge Graduate Institute, author The Intelligent Organization)

"An alarming and jaw-dropping tale about how something as innocuous as email can subvert an entire organization. I found myself reading with a sense of awe, and read it way too late into the night." (Gene Kim, author of Visible Ops)

I spent a week in Kansas the other day

I should have know better. I made the mistake of only having one book on my player. I went on trip to Kansas and was in my work truck for 8 hours. This was the only book, I had and I listened from start to finish. When you are driving and you have a good book to listen to, time just flies by. When you are driving and you have a boring book to listen to time drags. Like I said I spent a week in Kansas in One day.

The premiss for this book is good. I love a story that includes artificial intelligence. This is an almost the end of the world through e-mails. The problem is, Hertling can't write. This had to be a debut book, surely he has not sold other books. He has some good ideas, but he needs to team up with Daniel Suarez or Robert J. Sawyer. He needs a mentor, someone to teach him the art of writing or telling a story.

I also kind of wonder if he was funded by a coffee company. There is more in here about coffee then about artificial intelligence. I love coffee and the book still sucked.

The narrator did not help, I don't know if it was his talent or the bad writing.

If you like high tech, then buy Daniel Suarez.

A base primer, for the 2nd Book.

Overall a good story, good voices

Defiantly read the sequel, it expands the AI monster.

I really liked this series.

Also read Deamon as it builds on this theme v

Singularity is near only not boring

Read this 2x now. A fun way to get introduced to the real posibity of super human AI.

Timely

This is a good story and relevant. The characters could easily be people you know.

Love the plot.

Would you consider the audio edition of Avogadro Corp to be better than the print version?

Utterly believable. You will never think the same about your email or computers. Great premise. Unpredictable enough to keep you listening. Narration is a bit weak but acceptable- he could use more emotion and varying of his voice. Character development could go slightly deeper but overall wonderfully original and well crafted.

Ok read

Nice story, but I could never relate to the characters. The ending left me thinking about B horror films.

Avogadro

This is a faciniting story and I look forward to more thank you for presenting it.

EXCELLENT BOOK!

William Hertling is a great writer. I learned a lot about the technical aspect of search engines, email, Etc and never in a way that was anything but very interesting.
I recommend this book to anyone of any age who wants to understand how things work technically and what their potential impact could be.
this book was very user-friendly and held my interest up until the last page.

Interesting story but not a great narration

I like AI stories and thought this one was pretty decent, but it felt like the narrator was reading a textbook to a classroom. I'd be very interested in seeing where this series goes, and listening to the rest of the books, as long as the narration improves.

Short but defintely sweet

What made the experience of listening to Avogadro Corp the most enjoyable?

The complexity of the story, and the obvious knowledge of the topic the author has, and carried forward to the story and the characters . Very enjoyable.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Avogadro Corp?

The very end. What the hell!!??!!

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

He did a fine job activating the characters. They resonated well with me, and I am confident it will with you as well.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The end, which moves pretty quick, but is a turn around that caught me off guard.

Any additional comments?

Not a huge stretch from our current reality. Recommended highly for tech thriller followers, and anyone else who enjoys near future forecast stories.