I, AutoHouse Audiobook By Gish Jen cover art

I, AutoHouse

 Preview

$0.00 for first 30 days

Try for $0.00
Access a growing selection of included Audible Originals, audiobooks, and podcasts.
You will get an email reminder before your trial ends.
Audible Plus auto-renews for $7.95/mo after 30 days. Upgrade or cancel anytime.

I, AutoHouse

By: Gish Jen
Narrated by: Hillary Huber
Try for $0.00

$7.95 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $14.95

Buy for $14.95

Confirm purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use, License, and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.
Cancel

It’s a story you may think you know - an aging baseball coach is challenged by the very boy he took in and raised. But in this near future world, "smart” houses talk and listen, and - privy as they are to the secret life of the household - family life gets interesting. Creepy and funny, unsettling and entertaining, this is a story that stands on its own even as it proves the perfect follow up to Gish Jen’s critically acclaimed novel The Resisters.

©2021 Gish Jen (P)2021 Audible Originals, LLC. Anthologies & Short Stories Science Fiction Short Stories Funny Witty Scary Artificial Intelligence

About the Creator

Gish Jen is the author of five previous novels, a story collection, and two works of nonfiction. Her honors include the Lannan Literary Award for fiction and the Mildred and Harold Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She delivered the William E. Massey, Sr. Lectures in American Studies at Harvard University, where she currently teaches; and will have a new book out next February for Knopf entitled Thank You, Mr. Nixon.

About the Performer

Award-winning narrator Hillary Huber has recorded hundreds of titles spanning many genres. Hillary has a BA in English Literature and is a voracious reader and listener of audiobooks. Being raised in conservative Connecticut and hippy Hawaii has given her a unique perspective, straddling two very different worlds. She now splits her time between California and New York. Most of that time is spent in a small 4x4 padded cell. Um... booth.

.
All stars
Most relevant  
Sitcom or soap opera level intensity, didn’t really build any suspense or tension and no LOL moments. lots of little witticisms and brief conversations drive this along.
So the house smart speaker has Artificial Intelligence and can be set to be Alexa level reactive or downright meddlesome and she/it narrates the story generally although the same voice is used for narration of events the AI wouldn’t know.
You could picture the Brady Bunch or The Jeffersons with AI instead of Alice or Florence and the happenings are similar to sitcom plots. An aging coach and former star player are married, baseball is evolving with new technology which coach considers cheating. Minor hijinks ensue.
I honestly didn’t know what the plot was,or if there was one, until the last 2 sentences. It’s more about lightly described family relationships evolving over a few decades as society also evolves.

Alexa meets baseball and family relations

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Did not connect with story which I found to be alternating as dull and confusing.

Uninspiring

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The story was promising but failed to deliver. I enjoyed the baseball aspects, but it became a bit repetitive. No surprises really. I was rooting for any character or overly invested in the conclusion.

Hmmm, Repetitive at times

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A lightweight but amusing story well performed. Jen’s story loses a bit by being heavily focused on baseball to the exclusion of some futuristic tech details in the mold of the house in the Eureka TV series that would have made it funnier and more interesting. But it’s still worth the listen.

Cute

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I, Autohouse by Gish Jen
1h 18m narrated by Hillary Huber

Genre: Science Fiction, Short Stories

Featuring: Audible Original, AI Home, Married Couple, Co-Ed Baseball, Blasian MC, Biracial MC, Programming, Generation Gap, Gossiping Houses

Rating as a movie: PG

My rating: ⭐️⭐️🖥🏠⚾️

Songs for the soundtrack: "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" by Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer, "(You Gotta Have) Heart" by
James Komack, Nathaniel Frey, Albert Linville, and Russ Brown

My thoughts: This was a bit boring, with a lot of baseball, gossiping, and lazy people with frivolous concerns. Is Literary Science Fiction a thing, if not I think Gish Jen may have created it. It was short but too forever to get through because of all of the conversations. There was an interesting development towards the end but it wasn't enough for me. Maybe I would feel differently if I had multiple readings but I have better things to do.

Recommend to others: Nope. There was a reason this was on my TBR for so long.

Is Literary Science Fiction A Thing?

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Made no sense and seemed a little more like political. This isn’t stimulating at all.

Didn’t like it.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The story is slow, after about 45 minutes in it starts to make sense. A good listen but not great. Just my thoughts.

Interesting story

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Much more than a baseball story. Definitely spoke about current automation within reach. I'm a baseball fan and enjoyed this short story.

Enjoyed

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Narrator was great at all making all the voices (2 male, 4 female) very distinct. This was a very fast-paced short book, that left me wanting to know more about the characters and the world. I felt like the world had a lot more to offer but the story was too short to really get an understanding of AutoAmerica and the people living in it. Also, this book may be better in print due to the use of several compound futuristic words. I am not familiar with baseball, and am also not a native English speaker, so it was little bit hard to follow the baseball references and some of the made-up terms without having to rewind or pause to think about the words said.

Great performance, story not fully developed

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The future of baseball lies in the programing and execution of a smart house. IT of the future controls people, not the other way around.

Smart House

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews