A Thousand Blues

About

From its perch atop a junk pile in an abandoned shed, Coli — a robot with the rare capacity for emotion — gazes at the sky and marvels at its blues. When a young girl obsessed with robots discovers Coli, they form an unlikely partnership to save a life. But first they must become friends, put themselves at risk, and pull off an elaborate deception in a near-future Korea where the line between human and artificial feeling has blurred beyond recognition. Cheon Seon-ran writes science fiction with emotional warmth that never tips into sentimentality. Coli's wonder at the sky is genuine, not programmed — and that distinction drives the novel's central question about what makes consciousness real. A Thousand Blues is a novel about the color of the sky as seen by something that was never supposed to notice it.