The Kingdom by Jess Rothenberg

 

For my next read, I decided to pick a book for my Clear the Shelves Challenge based purely on my mood (something I'm trying to do a lot more often this year). I wanted something quick and exciting, so I went with Jess Rothenberg's The Kingdom. This YA science fiction novel was released in 2019, and I was instantly intrigued by its concept. It was being billed as a young adult Westworld, which is one of my favorite shows. Accordingly, I settled in expecting lots of suspense and ethical dilemmas.

The plot follows a hybrid (an extremely life-like robot) named Ana that works at a technologically advanced fantasy theme park called The Kingdom. Ana was created to play the role of a princess and entertain the guests by providing them with an immersive fantasy experience. She performs alongside her six sister hybrids, each one taking on the persona of a different royal character. She's done this for years, and enjoys making the guests happy, as she has been programmed to do. 

However, as the novel begins, something has clearly gone wrong. We first meet Ana while she is being interviewed after a terrible crime has occurred in The Kingdom. She has been accused of killing a park employee, and is on trial for the murder. Ana insists she is innocent, but video surveillance tapes seem to prove otherwise. As the novel progresses, the story flips back and forth in time between transcripts from the trial and Ana's narration of the events leading up to it. Both halves of the story explore the ideas of what it means to be human, if a robot could eventually learn enough to cross that barrier, and what types of rights and protections should a being like Ana be entitled to. 

This novel started out strong, and I was pulled into the story right away. I thought that Jess Rothenberg did a good job narrating from a robot perspective, and the way Ana explained her programming and abilities made her a very intriguing character. Once the plot started to pick up and things started going wrong, I enjoyed watching her try to rationalize decisions and responses that were outside of her supposed abilities. I love a robot-learning-to-love story, and this delivered on that classic sci-fi trope in a satisfying way throughout the first part of the book. The theme park setting was interesting as well, and I enjoyed learning about the different roles for the princess hybrids and how they worked within the park. I wouldn't have minded more detail about this being included, but the fast pace of the novel didn't really allow for it. I was totally into the story for the first three quarters, and was thinking this would probably end up being a four star read for me.  

However, the ending of the novel was a major fumble. As the plot moved towards its conclusion, it became incredibly rushed and choppy. The action unfolded too fast, too many details were thrown at the reader and left half-explained, and Ana's romantic storyline progressed too quickly.  The shift in pacing was abrupt and jarring. The content of the story changed as well. Rothenberg ended up moving away from the serious moral questions and complex topics she was exploring in favor of theatrical violence and cheap reveals. Ana became much less sympathetic of a character after this switch. Her personality seemed to change completely in a way that rang false to me. Earlier in the story, she was pondering what it meant to be human and was cautiously exploring the inconsistencies in her world. In the final chapters, she was aggressive, pessimistic and abrasive. While one could argue that her experiences have made her this way, the switch didn't feel organic to me. I think this book could have used more pages to bridge this gap.

I also have to bring up the numerous similarities to Westworld, which became excessive as I read on. I'm fine with this story being inspired by that series (in fact, that's one of the reasons I was interested in reading this in the first place), but there was just so much in these pages that felt a little too close to that show. To create a list of everything I noticed would have numerous spoilers, so I'll just mention one element in particular that I felt was a blatant copy. At one point, Ana mentions a quote from Romeo and Juliet - "These violent delights have violent ends." This particular line was used multiple times in Westworld. Granted, it was used for different reasons in the show than in The Kingdom, but the fact that this one specific line was included at all pointed to an over-reliance on that show for ideas in my mind. As this book is entertaining, but definitely not as compelling as Westworld, the similarities became increasingly funny to me and took me out the moment while reading. 

So while The Kingdom started off very intriguing and strong, the ending was a disappointment. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I didn't enjoy the story, but it's not going to be a book that sticks in my mind. It's too bad, because I thought that the concept had a lot of promise and the opening chapters set up an interesting world that I wanted to explore. On a positive note, the young adult audience for which this was intended will probably have no issues with it, especially if they haven't seen Westworld before. Ultimately, this wasn't a favorite for me. However, at least I have another book crossed off my TBR now that I can donate to a reader who will probably appreciate it more.  

Challenge Tally

Clear the Shelves 2021: 3/50 (donate)

Total Books Read in 2021: 6