Struggles Reviews: Annie Bot
Hey Alexa, play What Was I Made For by Billie Eilish
The perfect way to prepare for Annie Bot by Sierra Greer is to listen to What Was I Made For? by Billie Eilish. It perfectly encapsulates the story Greer is trying to tell
Synopsis: Annie Bot was created to be the perfect girlfriend for her human owner, Doug. Designed to satisfy his emotional and physical needs, she has dinner ready for him every night, wears the cute outfits he orders for her, and adjusts her libido to suit his moods. True, she’s not the greatest at keeping Doug’s place spotless, but she’s trying to please him. She’s trying hard.
She’s learning, too.
Doug says he loves that Annie’s artificial intelligence makes her seem more like a real woman, but the more human Annie becomes, the less perfectly she behaves. As Annie's relationship with Doug grows more intricate and difficult, she starts to wonder whether Doug truly desires what he says he does. In such an impossible paradox, what does Annie owe herself?
Content Warnings (from users of StoryGraph): Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Sexual content, Body shaming, Sexual assault, Confinement
Review (May contain spoilers):
I heard about this book a few months back when the GoodReads awards were happening and people were discussing their picks for the finals. It was, of course, added to my list of books to pick up if and when I found them at a used bookstore. Well the book gods blessed me recently with a copy (I wasn’t even actively looking for it if I’m being honest) and now I’m obsessed with the story and if very quickly became a new favorite of mine.
Annie is a Stella, an AI robot, set to “Cuddle Bunny” mode. Her main purpose is to be a sex bot for Doug. She is set to autodidactic mode so she can appear to be more human than robot. Everything about her is set to her owners specification: her looks, her personality, her wants. She has no control over how she functions and is expected to be perfect all the time, otherwise she is punished. When she goes against what Doug wants, it brings her extreme stress and anxiety.
Doug is Annie’s owner (Ugh I hate saying that. It feels gross.). He decided to get a Stella set to “Cuddle Bunny” mode after a nasty break up with his ex girlfriend. He dropped a good amount of money on her, like $22,000.
One thing that really messed me up was that he made Annie look very similar to his ex, which is one of many red flags. Even his friend, who is visiting to ask for him to be his best man, thinks its weird. Now the company that sells Stella, Stella-Handy, makes it a point to say you cannot have a Stella that looks like a real person. Even knowing this, Doug makes Annie look like his ex. He willingly makes a robot set to be a sexual partner look like his ex.
The symbolism is very clear in this: society views women as objects for men to use how and when they want. Annie subjected to abuse and manipulation in almost every chapter. Hell, she even runs away with the new Stella Doug bout for cleaning because she thought he was going to have her turned off and destroyed for angering him. She becomes depressed, anxious, and sometimes scared of Doug but has no way to figure out how to be better for him.
“She can't find a single answer to her problem except to turn off. To sleep. And then the problem is there for her again when she wakes, lurking until she'll have time to think about it when night comes around again.”
Doug is a walking red flag, abusive man. He shames her for how she looks, even asks for her to have bigger breasts and to have weight removed because she isn’t thin enough for him.
“I don’t want to change. I like my body the way it is.” Tammy looks doubtful.
“I mean, you just heard him approve the changes. You don’t want to displease him, do you?”
Annie is told by everyone that her only purpose is to please him and when she doesn’t please him, things get bad. He “punishes” her multiple times throughout the story for “disrespecting” him and when Annie tries to learn from what she did to correct the mistakes, he lashes out. The punishments range from “grounding” her to stay in one room until he says she can come out to turning her libido up to 10 and leaving her to suffer in a closet until her battery runs out. He promises trips and then rips them away from her as punishment.
Annie’s emotions are so real. Every time she felt anxious, afraid, confused, I really felt her struggles.
“Obviously, it was a fight. She knew that. Her question was stupid. But she can’t figure out what she did to make him so angry, and this puzzle tortures her. She can’t fix it, she can’t reduce his displeasure when she doesn’t know what she did to cause it.”
She was always trying to learn, to adapt, with little direction when she misspoke. She was always striving to please but couldn’t keep up with Doug’s anger.
Even though Doug tries to learn from his own mistakes and make Annie happier, I still cannot get past how manipulative he is towards her until the very end. Even when you think things are going to work out and he gives her what he thinks is good for her, its still serving him. Every decision he makes serves him, makes his life easier. House is messy? Annie needs to be better at cleaning. He doesn’t like being called out? Annie gets punished. His friend takes advantage of his robot? Annie basically gets tortured and locked in a closet. Sure, they go to therapy at one point, but Doug is the one to decide they are done.
The thing that really hurt was seeing Annie get excited for trips, only to have them taken away because Doug threw a tantrum over something small. He promised her camping, that doesn’t happen because she “tells him how to feel” and gets punished. He then comes to the conclusion that Annie should come with him to his friends wedding in Vegas. Not to actually do anything other than travel and stay in the hotel because he is embarrassed to be seen with a Stella. Unfortunately, he finds out about his friend taking advantage of Annie so he went alone.
Doug’s characterization is a great representation of toxic masculinity. He has to be in charge of everything “his woman” does. Even when he talks about his ex, its about how she never did what he wanted. She had a life that wasn’t revolving around pleasing him. He lives in a state of loneliness and craves companionship but only when it suits him. One thing that stuck out to me that really sold the walking red flag status for me was when he was discussing how great sex is natural but except her never has a headache or a period. He gets to use Annie however he wants, whenever he wants. She is his to control, end of story.
Final Thoughts
I loved this book. I’ve seen a few reviews that say the book is slow. When you really break things down, I think it needed a slower pace to really sell the story. Could the author have made the pace faster? Yes, but it would have taken away from Annie learning how to be more human and work through everything. She really needed the time to figure things out once she was set to autodidactic mode otherwise she would have been like all of the other versions of Stella.
This is a story about abuse, trauma, learning to live, and learning to break free. I cannot recommend it enough because I truly think about it every day since I finished it. Annie Bot by Sierra Greer is amazing and I cannot wait to see what she writes next.
What were your thoughts on Annie Bot?