I did like it at the start! And even a way in, it was still often funny. It wasn't so much the queueing tasks itself, I guess, as that UnCharles never gave me a feeling of personhood, more of being a somewhat lengthy joke on Tchaikovsky's part, so I could never lose myself in the story.

I've never wanted to be one of those 'I couldn't sympathise with the main character and therefore the book is rubbish' people. In this case I did sort of sympathise with UnCharles's position, yet at the same time, never (in the part of the book I read) did he seem more than a sophisticated digital kettle with some misfiring algorithms?

Heh, I'm starting to think I should go back to it.