This book is about getting hooked on credit cards and self optimisation. And this review is with spoilers, as always.

In an undefined but obviously near future a teen starts to use nano bots to effect some changes to her body. Harmony is her name and she just wants to look better. Become more attractive and be more popular. As this is quite successful she starts to add more and more features to her nanos' programming. Everybody else is doing it too and it is easy. You just scroll through the available add ons on your smart phone (like Take Control, Powerful Poise etc.), you choose the one you need and with a klick you get a shinier skin or better teeth color. Or thinner calves. Whatever is on offer and whatever you want you can add it to your nanos' programming with no effort at all.

The effects are real and the pay is virtual since it is of course payed by credit card. For every improvement you automatically sign a subscription contract. It works out quite well for Harmony and basically everything is fine (if you can ignore the vicious social behaviour of her and her peer group). But Harmony's fiancee is overdoing her upgrades somewhat causing a breakdown of her nano programming that she barely survives. Afterwards things have changed, Harmony tries to take back control of her self optimisation and leaves him. This leads to a job loss and all of a sudden she notices that she had long ago fallen into the classical subscription trap: everything is ok as long as the money is there. When the money is out for one reason or the other then everything breaks down. Ignoring it doesn't help as Harmony comes to notice.

We witness her breakdown from good job to less good job to no job at all. As Harmony is less and less able produce the money for her nano enhancements the programming businesses shut them down part by part. We see Harmony trying in vain to argue with call center agents to give her some leeway and in the end they even exercise punitive measures for missing payments like shutting down Harmony's sense of smell. The shutdown of the nano programs leads to a complete reforming of Harmony's body. She had been using these nanos for years and so it takes some time for her body to adjust to the lack of the nanos' interference. Her hips get wider, she gets fat, her hair reverts to normal color and texture. She has no money no job sees no perspective and is nearly 30 years old.

She goes to the only place left for her: her mother's house. Her mother is a very caring person but Harmony's relation to her is quite distanced. She does not directly despise her mother (she even had payed for some medical nano enhancements for her) but she sees her as too intrusive and had done everything to get away from her home before. Going back is a capitulation. And going without the nano optimisations is like a bad rehab: her body is slowly adapting back to the new normal, her real ugly self and her mind tries to cope with the fact, that she will never be able to afford further enhancements, since her actual debts will last for the next 100 years. Harmony is clearly not happy but she tries to live with it. Until in the end when her mother suffers a near fatal stroke she starts to see possibilities again to follow her addiction:

Nothing ridiculous, this time.
Nothing too far-fetched.
Something for her arse.
And maybe a little something for that flab of fat underneath her arms.
She will make the choice for herself, for who she wants to be.
She shall begin again.

The story is told in scenes that switch between Harmony's development after her breakdown and her earlier experiences, on her way towards the breakdown. That makes reading a little difficult. Another reason why I found reading the book difficult is that Harmony is not a nice person. She is totally self centered but also extremely dependent on other peoples' praise and acceptance. She gets addicted to the attraction of her fiancee even though he is constantly buying new add ons for her with her credit card to physically and mentally shape her to his wishes. She feels somewhat obliged to help her mother with medical nanos after her first stroke. This ends after the mother's second stroke when Harmony is living with her in her house and she decides to better spend the money on new apps for herself.

Harmony's problem is of course neither new nor futuristic. Money on credit cards is as real as physical money even though it is spent much much easier. And longing for physical enhancements is a problem already today. The pressure to optimize yourself to better fit the real or imaginate demands of society is already prevalent: be fitter, be better organised, have your nose carved into some more attractive shape, and those breasts! Women feel more subjected to these demands but this is becoming more sex independent. So once this self optimisation is easily reachable for everyone why should not everyone try to get there? The thing is to know when to stop.

Harmony doesn't know and is only forced to stop: first by the malfunction of her nanos and second by her lack of money. But also society as a whole doesn't know when to stop. These nanos are medicine and they can help fight diseases like strokes or heart attacks. But they also can go further: restore brain damage or repair damage through ageing. This unluckily doesn't make the damaged alive again, but only makes their bodys working. So that then there are lots of people who would have been brain dead (and thus really dead) in the old times but now can be living on, even though their minds are gone.

I really liked the book even though I severely dislike Harmony the more I think about her. It is well written and it made me think about things like: would I use these nanos until I became a mindless zombie lying in a bed in a geriatric clinic? But I sure would use them to prevent possible strokes! People really should be taught how to use credit cards correctly!

Buy the book and read it!

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