The Every is a 2021 dystopian novel by Dave Eggers, and a sequel to his 2013 novel The Circle.
It's 20 Minutes into the Future and the Circle, the world's largest technology company, has merged with a certain e-commerce site named after a South American jungle to become "the Every". With its unparalleled reach in communications, social media, surveillance technology, and commerce the Every is the richest, most dangerous monopoly on Earth and more powerful than any government.
Former park ranger and tech skeptic Delaney Wells has a plan. After spending years crafting a believable pro-tech persona and with the help of her anti-Every programmer friend Wes, she will get a job at the Every and bring it down from the inside.
The Every provides examples of the following tropes:
- 20 Minutes into the Future: Several mentions are made to the recent "two pandemics" (presumably the COVID-19 Pandemic and another pandemic following it) and "the 2020s" are referred to in the past tense. The novel also takes place 10 years after the events of The Circle.
- A True Story in My Universe: The film adaptation of The Circle exists in-universe where it would have been based on true events. Despite being made "by a talented director and starring actors of consummate skill" it was "considered unsuccessful and was seen by few", failing to tarnish the Circle's public image.
- The Bad Guy Wins: In the end, none of Delaney's efforts to discredit the Every in the eyes of the public yield any fruit. And to add insult to injury, the book ends with Every CEO Mae pushing Delaney off a cliff and hijacking all of her ideas to make the Every even more powerful.
- "Blackmail" Is Such an Ugly Word: The Every invents its own creative euphemisms, like "deëmployment" for the quarterly firing of the bottom 10 percent performing employees in each department.
- Double Agent: Stenton, the former CEO, seemingly abandoned the Every by going to work for Huawei. He actually was purposely sabotaging their business by encouraging them to develop thinner and cheaper phones, guaranteeing that Everyphones would become market leader.
- Either/Or Title: The book's full title according to the title page is The Every; Or At Last a Sense of Order; Or The Final Days of Free Will; Or Limitless Choice is Killing the World.
- Faux Affably Evil: Mae Holland's sweet and kind treatment of Delaney after the bombing is all an act to lull her into a false sense of security.
- Fictional Counterpart: The "ecommerce behemoth named after a South American jungle" that became part of the Every is never named but is obviously Amazon.
- Due to the acrimonious conditions of the merger it is not considered appropriate to say the company's previous name on campus and Everyones will just refer to it as "the jungle".
- The book mentions that the Circle acquired "the jungle" after it became overrun with knockoff products and that its CEO was happy to cash out so he could focus on his pet project of space travel with his fourth wife.
- Oddly enough, the Alexa voice assistant is mentioned by name later in the book.
- Insistent Terminology: Employees of the Every are called "Everyones". Later they rename their campus to "Everywhere" and the outside world is designated "Nowhere".
- Kicked Upstairs: The fates of two of the Wise Men after the events of The Circle. Ty has not been seen in public for years and is given an unlimited budget to research immortality, while Eamon Bailey was forced into semi-retirement and allowed to focus on his side-projects like space travel and shipwreck hunting as a distraction.
- Punctuation Shaker: Product names at the Every have plenty of umlauts and odd punctuation.
- Springtime for Hitler: Every one of Delaney's ideas that she thinks are ridiculous enough to make the public turn against the Every turn into massive successes.
- Sinister Surveillance: The Every have promoted the widespread adoption of their cameras worldwide (in the name of public safety), employee's mandatory smartwatches record every word they say and warn them for saying anything negative, and the general public is happy to post videos "shamming" (publicly shaming) everyone around them for transgressions like littering or cutting in line.
- Switching P.O.V.: In the final section of the book, the POV shifts to Mae Holland just before she pushes Delaney off a cliff.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Mae Holland, now the CEO of the Every, has sidelined the prior leadership to maintain her grip on power. This includes forcing Eamon Bailey into semi-retirement and keeping his passion projects on a "short leash". After Eamon's death later in the book she cuts funding to them entirely. The book ends with Mae shoving Delaney off a cliff, deciding there is no need to hold any sort of public memorial beyond a 20 second eulogy on her next livestream, and then presenting Delaney's ideas as her own.
