TJ Klune turns Carlo Collodi's The Adventures of Pinocchio on its ear with In the Lives of Puppets, making his protagonist, Victor Lawson, a real boy, and Gio, who raised him, a thinking, sentient robot.
Victor was entrusted as a baby to Gio by parents on the run from robots seeking to wipe out the human race. Gio built his home high in the Oregon treetops: "There was safety among the trees and away from the harsh, blinding lights and cacophony of the city he'd left behind." But what exactly did Gio leave behind? Vic, now 21, and Gio tinker with robotics, and Vic has salvaged from the junkyard two friends: Rambo, a sentient vacuum cleaner, and Nurse Ratched, a robot as prickly as her Cuckoo's Nest namesake. When Vic brings home an invention from Gio's past, Vic unleashes chaos in their protected world, leading him on a quest to save Gio. This fable for adults will cause readers to consider what it is to be human and how to hold onto those qualities as the culture becomes more virtual.