The Lifecycle of Software Objects
- Hugo Award for Best Novella
- Locus Award for Best Novella
- Seiun Award for Best Translated Short Story
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Our view
“The Lifecycle of Software Objects” asks what we owe the artificial minds we raise, and asks it with unusual tenderness. Ted Chiang’s novella follows digital beings and their human trainers across many years, as questions of personhood grow with them. Some readers miss human drama, finding that little happens to the people themselves. For others its power builds slowly and lies less in technology than in what it means to care for another.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
The Lifecycle of Software Objects is a novella by American writer Ted Chiang, originally published in 2010 by Subterranean Press. It focuses on the creation of digital entities and their growth as they are raised by human trainers over the course of many years. The novella received critical praise, winning the 2011 Locus Award for Best Novella and the 2011 Hugo Award for Best Novella.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.6 across 106 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 42% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Science fiction average of 7.8. That is how 7.8 comes out. A further +0.10 comes from the small bonus for major awards.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.4 | 11 | 10% |
| Hardcover | 7.5 | 95 | 90% |
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
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