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    Little Brother
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    Little Brother
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    Little Brother
    Audiobook11 hours

    Little Brother

    Written by Cory Doctorow

    Narrated by Kirby Heyborne

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    Marcus, a.k.a "w1n5t0n," is only seventeen years old, but he figures he already knows how the system works-and how to work the system. Smart, fast, and wise to the ways of the networked world, he has no trouble outwitting his high school's intrusive but clumsy surveillance systems.

    But his whole world changes when he and his friends find themselves caught in the aftermath of a major terrorist attack on San Francisco. In the wrong place at the wrong time, Marcus and his crew are apprehended by the Department of Homeland Security and whisked away to a secret prison where they're mercilessly interrogated for days.

    When the DHS finally releases them, Marcus discovers that his city has become a police state where every citizen is treated like a potential terrorist. He knows that no one will believe his story, which leaves him only one option: to take down the DHS himself.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateApr 29, 2008
    ISBN9780739372869
    Author

    Cory Doctorow

    Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction author, activist and journalist. He is the author of many books, most recently The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation, a Big Tech disassembly manual; Red Team Blues, a science fiction crime thriller; Chokepoint Capitalism, non-fiction about monopoly and creative labour markets; the Little Brother series for young adults; In Real Life, a graphic novel; and the picture book Poesy the Monster Slayer. In 2020, he was inducted into the Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.

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    Reviews for Little Brother

    4/5

    2,107 ratings218 reviews

    What did you think?

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    • 4/5
      Set about 10-15 years into the future, no definite date given, San Francisco is bombed by terrorists. The Department of Homeland Security comes in and starts "detaining" people. All types of people; including a 17 year old hacker. When he's released, he starts a resistance movement and works towards regaining everyone's freedom from terror.
    • 5/5
      Readers Annotation:Marcus and his friends skip school to meet up to play Harajuku Madness. While they are out the San Francisco bay bridge is targeted in a terrorist attack. The group of teenagers is profiled as potential terrorists and are picked up and held for questioning and undergo psychological torture. After Marcus is released he is determined to thwart Homeland Security for what they did to him and his friends. Plot Summary:Marcus and his friends skip school to meet up and play Harajuku Madness. While they are out the San Francisco bay bridge is attacked by terrorists. Because they fit the profile, Marcus and his friends are detained and interrogated in Alcatraz. After Marcus is released he is determined to thwart Homeland Security and find out what has happened to his friend who doesn’t come back. Homeland Security is taking advantage of the attack to usurp the rights of American citizens, detaining them if their BART use is questionable is one example of this. Marcus can tell that his laptop has been tampered with when he gets home because he was the one who built it. As a way to get around being spied on by the government he takes an Xbox universal and Paranoid Linux as an operating system. Paranoid Linux allows the user to encrypt everything, with the assumption the user is under attack. Marcus makes up CD’s of Paranoid Linux and distributes them to hackers throughout the city, thus creating a network of rebel teens that don’t like having their freedoms taken away. Evaluation:This book was really interesting. Although I’m not normally a Sci-Fi reader I found I had a difficult time putting this particular book down. The character, Marcus, is very believable. His methods to thwart the government in his attempt to locate his missing friend also seem plausible. This book really makes you think about the potential invasion of privacy that our government could resort to in the name of protecting its citizens under the Department of Homeland Security. It opens your eyes to the rights and freedoms that we take for granted everyday as American citizens. Even after I was finished with the book I had a hard time dropping the concepts that were set in it. I found myself searching on the internet for Paranoid Linux and reading about the MIT student that hacked the Xbox. Ages: 14+/Interests: Espionage, Mystery, Science Fiction, and Action-Adventure.
    • 4/5
      Kearsten says: I almost added 'horror' to the tags list, 'cause this one is *that* scary. The way things spiral out of control in _Little Brother_ in the wake of a terrorist attack in San Francisco is familiar, as is the methodical stripping away of Americans' privacy.Quite frankly, I didn't understand much of what Marcus did (and explained - over and over), but I was frightened of it nonetheless. Though a good portion of this story seems to be somewhat veiled preaching about government-sanction abuse of freedom (and while he's preaching to the choir, personally, I found it becoming tiresome after a while), Little Brother is scary, exhilarating and a very relevant cautionary tale.A must-read for pretty much everyone...Susan says: Merideth had said that this book had a lot of techno-babble, and it definitely does. But I found it a really interesting coming of age book for this year, with the elections and all of the debate about freedom. Marcus is 17 years old, and is technologically advanced when he and three friends skip school to take part in a electronic scavenger hunt. At that moment, terrorists blow up the Bay Bridge and they are arrested by the Department of Homeland Security. They are tortured and kept illegally, and then when Marcus is let go, he begins a campaign to expose DHS and bring them down. This is definitely a politically important book, with a lot of things that teens should be thinking about. It also made me as paranoid as Marcus is, looking over my shoulder all the time. Marcus is a strong character, who fights the system, even in his own parents. And the adventure and technology will make this interesting to older readers, who can get their minds around the complexities of what Doctorow is talking about.
    • 4/5
      Spec Fiction has never been something I actively sought out, but Little Brother was something that demanded that it be read. Cory makes his works available to all comers and it makes him generous. He works speak with such a universal understanding you can't not read from beginning to end almost without stopping.
    • 3/5
      I read this one on my palm - which was kind of annoying. I should've just gotten the book from the library! Anyway, it was an entertaining YA adventure created to expound on the author's interests - right to privacy vs. government abuses and some hacking. The characters were a little flat, but the story was fun and interesting.
    • 2/5
      I've been meaning to read Little Brother for a long time, so when it came up for the SF/F course on Coursera, it seemed like it was finally time. Maybe it got built up a bit too much over time, because I found it fairly disappointing. There's something very immature about it -- in some ways, that's part of its charm, because it's enthusiastic and straightforward and the characters/plot are earnest.But. While I enjoy Cory Doctorow's non-fiction writing (he writes very clearly about copyright, piracy, etc), I haven't enjoyed his fiction nearly as much. He seems to write still partly in a non-fiction mode: we get lectured about the world he's setting up, rather than seeing it in action. It's like a thought experiment, a way of playing out his concerns. There's a place for that, of course, but it's a lot easier to swallow when it's wrapped up in prose like that of Ursula Le Guin. This probably is a fairly direct comparison to books like Charlotte Perkins Gilman's Herland: it's a story born of convictions more than of the urge to tell a story, I think.For a reader who is used to Cory Doctorow's work and already interested in this kind of thing, the narrator's explanations are unnecessary, and even for those who are not, it's a bit heavy-handed. Doctorow's writing is clear, and he gets his points across... but for me, that was a trade off against flow and interest.I don't really see why people found this so fascinating and absorbing, I'm afraid.
    • 5/5
      Whew. I only wanted to take a peek into the book, then put it away until the evening. Now, some eight hours later, I have read through the whole book and, what can I say, it was well worth the time.

      The story is easy and interesting to read, while still being scary as hell. When contrasting what I was reading in the book with our situation today, I'd say that, if we are not careful, we may reach that level of pervasiveness of surveillance within five years, if we haven't done so already.

      Taken on its own, the story would be a 4.5-Star for me. It is interesting, funny, scary, and gripping, all at the same time. The final 0.5 stars come from the ebook being released under a Creative Commons License (CC-BY-NC-SA), meaning it is free (as in beer, and speech) to download and read. Also, the Introduction, Afterwords, and Bibliography are great as well, and I greatly respect the author (hey, no one said I was being objective in rating this book).

      If I had to leave you with a single sentence about this book, it would be "read it!". I'm going to buy a few copies, keep one and give the others away. This book, while not as openly depressing as 1984, is something everyone should have read at least once.
    • 5/5
      This is my first Doctorow book, and I have to say I'm impressed. A great book full of allegorical tales to reflect where paranoia will eventually lead. Absolutely a great book.
    • 4/5
      Good social satire and how-to manual, but I had trouble with the reporter-ex-machina ending.
    • 1/5
      I get that this book is being treated well because it is so topical, and I love the kinds of thinking it's presenting.

      That being said, the book fails to build any tension and reads like Cory Doctorow is lecturing you the whole time. If you're somewhat tech savvy, that means he's lecturing you on stuff you already know. However, this book is meant for adolescents, and I guess that makes sense. Hopefully it will move kids to be more interested in privacy and liberty, which in this day in age means understanding how technology works and making it work for you.

      One layout thing: it is cool that he dedicates each chapter to a different bookstore, but his dedications are at length, so it takes you completely out of the story.
    • 5/5
      triple-plus-good!
    • 3/5
      After finishing this book I was convinced that I could and should be a hacker. Technobabble = Awesome. Too bad almost all of the characters were straight boring.
    • 3/5
      A quick & easy read. A bit heavy-handed with the anti-government rhetoric - but that's easily forgiven as it is the point of the story. The characters, while not strongly rendered, are fun to follow on their (mis)adventures and the technical jargon is not too overwhelming. Truthfully, I'm a computer person so the explanations of things like cryptography and coding were familiar ground. Anyone not versed in these things might find those sections boring or confusing, although I think the breakdowns were straight-forward enough for anyone to understand - if perhaps somewhat unnecessary to the storyline.Though rather clumsily handled at times, I did enjoy Doctorow's use of Socratic style conversations between characters to argue both sides of the issues presented in the book. Marcus' father was a fun foil that helped bring out both sides of the public safety vs. privacy intrusions issue. On the other hand, Marcus's classmate Charles, was just too hiss-able of an adversary to be believable. Still, the sheer geekiness of the tale was fun to experience.
    • 5/5
      An wonderful warning of what could happen should the government disregard privacy.
    • 5/5
      This book. THIS BOOK, YOU GUYS! So awesome. Also a bit of an uneasy and unsettling read. Hits close to home, and easy to see how things could go that way. But it's fantastic, I could not tear through it quickly enough.
    • 4/5
      Slow to start. I read the first two chapters very haltingly - pick it up, put it down, stare at it for a few days. Try again. About halfway through the book I decided it was a trainwreck - terrible...but fascinating at the same time. It wasn't until the end where I genuinely liked it and was intrigued and cared about how it ended.
    • 5/5
      Im not the target demographic for this book but i loved it and recomend it to Young people i wortk with. A great boot for YA and you.
    • 4/5
      Fantastic! Exciting! Revolutionary! Authentic! Terrifying...
    • 4/5
      Perhaps my opinion will change in a few years, but I found this to be so topical considering our nation's political environment that it kept distracting me from the flow of the story. Not preachy, not hectoring, not snarky; just overly relevant to current events.
    • 4/5
      The only reason I'm not giving this 5 stars is because his mom is referred to as both Louise and Lillian on the same page. And his hair kept changing lengths. But other than that, I thought it was FANTASTIC. Make me never want to buy anything with a credit card ever again. Especially my T pass.
    • 4/5
      Terrific book, try it out you can download it for free from his site.
    • 4/5
      I had never heard of this book before reading it for the coursera SF and F class--so I was shocked to find it my favorite book of the class.

      It's YA, but this is high school YA, not middle school.

      Fascinating, and I wish I could get my high schooler to read it. After the Bay Bridge is bombed, the DHS goes into SF and begins instituting "surveillance to catch terrorists". Really, they are catching anyone they can and accusing them of being terrorists. High school hackers work to undermine and then expose their methods, lies, and their secret prison on Treasure Island.

      Would also be a great book for classroom discussion.
    • 4/5
      I've been following Cory Doctorow for a while, and this has been sitting on my shelves waiting to make it to the top of the list. I'm very happy that it finally made it to the top of the reading pile as it was a quick and easy read that I enjoyed.

      The premise is that the terrorists have won, because the securuty state that they have spawned has stolen away all our freedoms. This tale is told through the eyes of a tech savvy 17 year old who works the system to get out of school and play a game with his friends. However they end up in the wrong place when there is a real terrorist attack, and in trying to help their injured friend against the flow of the emergency responders they end up in the Department of Homeland Security's dragnet.

      The story plays out how the powers can ruin people's lives, simply because they are in the wrong place, and they refuse to conform because they are strong in their belief in their own innocence and the ideals of freedom. It is written for a young adult audience, and some of this plays out in the plotting. The teenagers eventually prevail over The Man, although there is some very subtle assistance from a veteran investigative journalist (which are themselves very rare these days).

      It was interesting mostly because as well as being a story it is also the kernel of a howto protect yourself from internet surveillance. It is only a little out of date, but all the techniques mentioned would still work today.

      Well worth reading.
    • 3/5
      Little Brother is a fairly entertaining book about 16 & 17 year olds in San Francisco turned into a police state by the Department of Homeland Security, how they fight back by subverting the security apparatus's own technology, and ultimately save the day for Truth, Justice, and the Constitution. That sounds kind of snarky, because the story isn't bad, but it's also only about 1/2 of the novel. The other half is Cory Doctrow explaining basic encryption, RFIDs, data mining, andsurveillance technology along side trying to convince you to worry about your own information security and resist panopticon government. Chance are, if you're reading his book you already know a bunch of that anyway. Probably the best audience for this book is a friend of yours, in their teens or 20s who doesn't think there is anything wrong with government information drag-nets because "innocent people have nothing to hide" and "it's for our protection" but still might be persuaded otherwise.
    • 4/5
      real fun book, about teenagers, and written so a teenager would enjoy it, but it also has themes of Down With The Man, and anti goverment sentiments. Real fun read!
    • 3/5
      A great book. I plan to read more Cory Doctorow and love his web site Boing Boing. Also this book invoked a sort of need to learn how to program, I have lost that need, but this book reopened my need to learn to write code. So today I went and bought a book on HTML Code. So hoping for new things this year. A book that changed my year!
    • 4/5
      I loved it. Personally I would have preferred slightly less of the technology explanations and history lessons but maybe that's just because most of it was not new to me. That's really the only reason I didn't give it five stars. Moving on to Homeland straight away.
    • 5/5
      I was in high school when 9/11 happened, and this book resonated with me in a very personal way. I remember, like the protagonist, being horrified at what was happening to the country, and feeling alone in that sentiment.

      And of course, being a Cory Doctorow novel, this book is full of kickass heroes and references to cool real things.
    • 3/5
      Honestly I was expecting something more like a novel and less like one of Cory Doctorow's blog posts. There's a lot of infodumping in this - good info, but the whole first half of the book has more info than story.And...well, books like this always date, but I feel like this one has dated badly in just a few years. Not the technology, that's all still pretty good, but the social situation. Reading about an upper-middle-class white kid going to war against the government in the wake of everything happening in Ferguson, Missouri makes me want to pat him on the head and give him a cookie. (Doctorow does address the race disparity once - but only once.)
    • 3/5
      The book had a lot of potential, but just seemed to fall short. I enjoyed the concept, though at times it felt a bit flat. There was definitely a tendency towards telling, as opposed to showing. If you aren't willing to read through a number of info-dumps, this probably isn't the book for you. (admittedly I found the info in said dumps interesting; the problem is when they interrupt the flow of the story)

      All of that said, it does prompt us to examine our privacy, rights and the "price of freedom" in a post-9/11, Patriot Act country