Amygdalatropolis

a book consisting of longing for an existence beyond the physical, corporeal realm, abandoning the flawed human body and becoming something different; whether 1404er ultimately succeeds at becoming something else, or is just a “centipede grasping for nothing” is left to the reader to decide. an extremely cold book, where genuine humanity is almost nowhere to be seen. there is no genuine connection in amygdalatropolis, it portrays a world consisting only of matter, algorithms and plastic.

the internet by design does not encourage sincerity or genuine connection, but instead enables people to engage in depravity through anonymity. amygdalatropolis is unflinching in its portrayal of this, going into great detail in portraying the worst of what humanity has to offer, depicting actions so vile that i probably couldn't mention them in this review even if i wanted to. amygdalatropolis documents a certain internet subculture in which lonely, disillusioned young men propagate their nihilistic views in an endless echo chamber/feedback loop. they join the internet partly due to a fear of external reality, the computer encourages to stay locked in their rooms, their parents enable them, etc... to this extent, this is probably the most accurate depiction of chronic internet indoctrination that ive ever engaged with. as the novel progresses 1404er becomes more and more of a husk, and by the time his conscious nags at him or when he's kneeling at his father's dust and recognizing the importance of his love, it's all too late.

the shadow of death is written everywhere in amygdalatropolis. both of 1404er's parents suffer and die due to failures of the body, 1404er orders decayed teeth from the internet, corpses are posted online and only live on through algorithms, etc. the nihilistic internet subculture 1404er finds himself in contributes to his jaded worldview and his total rejection of any real human connection.

this brings us to the video game sequence that even makes 1404er uneasy. in it, 1404er controls a dementia stricken farmer named henry. henry's wife suddenly dies one night and he can no longer recognize his own son. the sequence highlights the failings of the physical body, and calls into question the nature of free will and the amount of control we have over our own fate. we are just the byproduct of synapses and algorithms firing in our own brains and, depending on your viewpoint, this could mean that true free will doesn't exist at all. this outlook could potentially inform nihilistic internet subcultures and encourage their users to become mere husks, the receivers of info and stimuli. after all, if we're all merely puppets to things like external circumstances, our bodies or our consciousness, then why try to form deeper connections or engage with other people at all? we are no different from the computer, all we are is matter and plastic. the only answer is to succumb to total annihilation or surrender to stimuli and assimilate with the algorithm. amygdalatropolis obviously isnt advocating for this worldview, however acknowledging it gives the novel an extra layer of philosophical depth and addresses why people may come to these radical conclusions in the first place.

amygdalatropolis shows us how the internet may encourage an individual to discard their humanity. in the final chapter 1404er attempts to take his own life and wrestles with his conscious (i.e the “ghosts” in his head) before giving up and returning to his computer. the last scene really takes this idea of rejecting your humanity up a notch, eluding to some sort of transcendence beyond the flesh and becoming a being that exists purely through digital space or perhaps somewhere even greater. “a space perfect and vacuous, encasing him and his world and all that had ever belonged to it.”

Alone in the stretching night. He'd wipe his eyes and climb the stairs back to his bedroom, and collapse amidst the crusted up sweats atop the mattress. He'd sleep, again. It didn't matter so much anymore whether the computer was turned off all the way, and he barely touched his dick at all.

As someone who spent quite a lot of time on 4chan in his younger years, I'm a bit impressed with how authentic the imageboard posts that fill a lot of these pages are. The hateful, edgy lingo is perfect. The homophobia, the misogyny, the nihilism, the racism, the aggression, the lack of empathy and stunted reactions to suffering... It's all there as this book really doesn't pull any punches. And it makes for a fascinating digital setting for this story about an American hikikomori, barely existing in this world while the glow of a computer screen and the gore videos on it fill his already deformed mind as he swings between his bed and desk all day and night.

This is a disgusting book that can be hard to get through at points, but it's also very clever in its presentation and really engaging in its character study.
The author manages to capture this sort of hypnagogic state where the reader is confronted with the different layers of the protagonist's existence simultaneously, similar to how one might keep tabs on different threads on a message board at the same time. The chaotic digital conversations, the depressing real life, and the protagonist's dreams and memories all fill the pages at the same time, structured with some different formatting for easier distinction.
Aside from the general atmosphere, it also makes for some effective clashing of subjects. Like, for example, when the reader follows the users on the fictional 4chan-equivalent gather to organize a really cruel harassment campaign against a random person while also reading the chatlog of a camgirl stream where an overzealous viewer tries to clumsily express empathy towards the camgirl who shows signs of self-harm.
There is a lot in here about the two-faced, twisted moralities and values of (predominantly) men who lost their sense of reality and compassion after escaping into the unfiltered depths of the internet for too long, wasting away while celebrating the suffering of others.

The main character is an interesting extreme for that and while he is just as despicable as the other anonymous imageboard users, it is compelling to read how his life had developed to end in this dark place, how his world-view formed because of that, and how he deals with inevitable change when he is confronted with it.
This is a quick read but not necessarily an easy one given many of the fringe and transgressive subject matters that take part throughout this in one way or another. But I think if you are in the right headspace to take these things on and are interested in an exploration of this sort of lost soul, then this is a surefire recommendation. This specific online subculture has probably rarely been displayed this authentically and raw in fiction.