We The People by Russell Razzaque and T. J. MacGregor is a book about democracy and patriotism and doing the right thing. Luna Ochoa is a former government analyst who was fired when the new president took office. Now she works for Leo Montoya who is a reclusive billionaire who funds AI development and seems to be extremely leery of the new administration, something Luna shares. Working together they discover that AI seems to be predicting the complete fall of humanity as an outcome of the policies being followed by the new administration. When Luna runs into Jake Kessler, a reporter who lost everything after being critical of the administration, they find a way to alert the public about what has been predicted. As things get dangerous and dicey as a result of them speaking out they end up embroiled in a new underground movement, a highly democratic movement that has its roots in ancient Athens and Greek philosophy.
This book was definitely interesting and I found it amusing just how closely it parallels some of what is currently happening here in the United States. I can only assume this was done on purpose because it does not really attempt to hide that fact either even though it does not use any names for many of the government higher ups, including the fictional president who is behind what is going on. Keeping that in mind I want to congratulate the authors for being bold enough to speak out themselves about this even if in a fictional format. Time to focus on the story itself though. I enjoyed reading this and it was a pretty good story that was decently well written. There were a few things that I found I didn’t like that much though. A big one was just how fast everything developed in the story. I know that events like the ones depicted actually can accelerate and happen this fast but that was not necessarily where I saw the problem. My issue was that in these circumstances shown I highly doubt people would trust each other as fast and as easily as they did, even if you knew each other previously. I was a little concerned about that one because I wouldn’t trust that fast and it really seemed rushed here. Another one was that there were some plotlines that were not wrapped up by the end of the book that seemed rather important all things considered. I would not normally consider that an issue if it seemed like there would be a sequel, which it did not. Don’t get me wrong though as the book was good and had an extremely compelling story with some pretty interesting characters. It seemed highly believable as well considering everything actually going on. Take all of that into consideration and I am happy giving it 3.5 out of 5 stars.
This is a highly political thriller so if you happen to enjoy that you might consider trying it. I would also recommend this book to anyone who is concerned about the state of things currently happening in the United States. That being said, some of what it implies the government might do in that kind of situation is rather disturbing so be careful and be prepared before reading it. In terms of content that was really the only thing to be concerned about so I would have no problem with younger readers trying it as long as they are teens. No one younger than about thirteen or fourteen should be reading this just yet. I hope you will consider it and think about sharing your thoughts in the comments if you do. This book was acquired through the LibraryThing early reviewers program.