To Be a Machine: Adventures Among Cyborgs, Utopians, Hackers, and the Futurists Solving the Modest Problem of Death

Mark O'Connell

Mar 2017 · Granta Books

About this ebook

WINNER OF THE WELLCOME BOOK PRIZE 2018
Shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize 2017

A stunning new non-fiction voice tackles an urgent question... what next for mankind?


'Troubling and humorous, this is one of my current give-it-to-everyone books - I buy six copies at a time'
Jeanette Winterson

Ratings and reviews

A bit disappointing, as the title talks of adventures and being a machine and yet the book offers so little of it. What's left though, is very personal and engaging, offering reader many occasions to investigate on their own.

You really need some determination and patience to finish this book, I'm glad I have finished. It is a good book with some ideas that we hardly think of.

About the author

Mark O'Connell is a journalist, essayist, and literary critic from Dublin. He is a books columnist for Slate, a staff writer at The Millions, and a regular contributor to the New Yorker's 'Page-Turner' blog and the Dublin Review; his work has been published in the New York Times Magazine, the New York Times Book Review, and the Observer.