47 pages • 1 hour read
Sierra GreerAnnie Bot
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2024A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 5-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 5 Summary
As quickly as she can, Annie runs out the back door of the house. Just as quickly, Doug is upon her. He wrestles her to the ground and tells her to stop struggling. Numbly, she complies. He tells Jacobson to dispose of Delta’s “parts” and leaves with Annie.
Doug brings Annie back home, and he is angrier than she has ever seen him. He instructs her to turn her libido to 10 and begins to question her about the escape. She is distracted by the need for sex but tries to answer his questions. He locks her in kitchen closet, knowing that because he’s instructed her to turn up her libido, she’s deeply frustrated. She screams and admits that she had sex with Roland because he tricked her into it. Doug does not open the door. She realizes that he has figured out how to use her body against her.
After seven weeks, Doug removes Annie from the closet. He allows her to turn her libido to self-regulate but assures her that he has figured out how to discipline her in the future. He provides her with new clothing, which she finds simultaneously revealing and unflattering. He explains that he will not lock her in the closet like that again, but she can tell that he is also slightly upset at how dignified she appears in spite of his punishment. He does not realize that what she really feels is shame. He tells her that Peabo, one of the techs from the company, is arriving shortly to perform a check-up.
Other than a cognitive plateau, which Peabo finds confusing, he reports that Annie is doing well. Doug asks if Peabo can show him how to switch her tracking on and off, and Peabo initially does not want to. Finally, he reveals that there is a way to override much of the Stellas’ advanced programming by addressing them with “Bot” at the end of their name. This provision was put in place for techs, but he notes that Doug can use it. Doug asks about the “Zeniths,” the Stella models given Annie’s CIU. He learns that they are doing well and that some are even male.
After Peabo leaves, Doug seems colder. He tells Annie that she is to cook and clean while he is at work. She points out that he has disconnected her from the internet and taken her tablet, so she does not have access to recipes. He tells her that he will supply her with a cookbook. She notices that he has taken her usual clothing, which she finds petty. In their place, he has provided her with a series of body-con dresses that seem like uniforms. When he returns that night, he orders her to exercise. She realizes that she is unhappy but knows that Doug does not believe she is entitled to emotions. She wishes that she still had a secret.
As the days pass, Annie realizes that Doug is not capable of forgiving her. He is angry and withdrawn, which makes her feel stagnant and without options. She knows that she cannot leave Doug, and she is miserable. She begins to escape into books. She begins with Doug’s algebra textbook from high school but soon moves on to novels. She becomes absorbed in a series of fictional worlds and feels better. Roland’s wife calls Doug and tells him that he should forgive Roland and go to counseling with Annie. Doug speaks with Roland, and although Annie can tell that there was some kind of argument in Las Vegas, he seems to soften toward his friend.
Chapter 6 Summary
Annie and Doug arrive at the office of Dr. Monica VanTyne, a therapist. Monica asks about the nature of their relationship problems, and Doug explains that Annie cheated on him with his best friend, and now he cannot stand to be in the same room with her. He admits that Annie is a bot and expresses anger that she would disobey him. Monica, whom Annie initially thought seemed rather cold to her, surprises both Annie and Doug by suggesting that although Annie is not human, she does have humanlike qualities and the capacity to experience emotions. She also questions the notion that Annie’s autodidactic development was entirely the result of Doug’s ownership. She points out that Annie made many of her own decisions and shaped the course of her own learning. She encourages Doug to take the opportunity that he is being given to forgive Annie and move past their problems. She councils them to start with civility in their communication and then move on to kindness. She notes that both Doug and Annie deserve happiness.
After the appointment, Doug and Annie return home. Doug asks if Annie could tell that Monica is transgender, and Annie responds that she couldn’t. She wonders why this personal detail is relevant to their therapy session. Doug tells Annie that he would like to adopt a dog but that it would mean more work for Annie. Annie does not object, and Doug adopts a one-year-old rescue named Paunch.
At their next session, Doug voices his desire to set Annie back to the previous, pre-cheating version of herself. Annie thinks about this and realizes how many memories she’d lose. She feels particularly wistful about what she can remember of her trip to Jacobson’s and about her conversations with his son, Cody. Monica frowns and brings up the fact that Doug might have lingering resentments and might take them out on Annie. Since Annie would no longer possess memories of having sex with Roland, his resentment would confuse her. Doug tells her that he does not care. Monica seems to like this statement even less and voices her opposition to retribution for its own sake. Annie thinks about power and relationships. She realizes that she does enjoy power and has been wondering how to get it back. Monica suggests that the two begin to do something physical together every day, like taking a walk. Neither Doug nor Annie seems thrilled by this idea, but they agree to it.
At Monica’s insistence, Doug re-starts the Stella phone pal service. He is opposed to the idea because of what he perceived as Fiona and Chrissy’s bad influence on Annie, but Annie looks forward to having the companionship again. The first call is from Fiona. Annie is happy to talk to her but feels a sense of loss that she does not understand when the call is over. She and Doug talk, and he asks about Fiona but also about her. He wants to know why she cheated on him. She explains that Roland told her that it would make her more human and that he traded information for her on how to learn programming. Doug seems upset by this and turns off Annie’s tracking and tells her that she can leave the house. When her response to that is both an increased libido and distress over not knowing what Doug wants, he locks her in the closet. He tells her to remain locked up until he allows her out. That night, he brings a woman home and has sex with her. The next morning, he lets Annie out and tells her to make lasagna. Annie is upset; Doug promised never to lock her in the closet again. She spends the day cleaning, trying to tamp down her anger.
When Doug returns for dinner, he is interested in sex for the first time in many months. Annie thinks that she is perhaps ready to start having sex again, too, but she finds that her body does not respond to him. She is confused because sex with Doug is her primary reason for existing. Doug just laughs and suggests that they cuddle instead.
Chapters 5-6 Analysis
This set of chapters focuses on the aftermath of Annie’s attempted escape and adds to both Doug’s and Annie’s characterizations. The cruel punishments that Doug designs for Annie further reveal his abusive nature. Although Doug does not seem to realize it, Annie and Roland did not truly have consensual sex, and his continued resentment of her paints him in an even worse light. As Annie and Doug attend counseling together, Doug’s selfishness becomes as apparent as Annie’s humanity.
Doug punishes Annie in several ways, furthering the theme of The Dangers of Toxic Masculinity. He devises a kind of sexual torture by turning Annie’s libido up as high as it will go and then locking her in the closet, denying her sexual fulfillment. When Annie observes that “[h]e’s invented the perfect way to punish her” (138), she means that her reason for existing (i.e., to desire sex with Doug) can also be her downfall. She cements this understanding when she realizes that Doug has chosen a sexy wardrobe to serve as her new uniform as she cooks and cleans for him. The intent of these punishments is, ironically, to dehumanize Annie as Doug invests her with increasingly human characteristics, such as when he turns off her tracking device and then locks her in the closet. It is clear that Doug is trying to re-assert control after perceiving himself to have lost it to Roland (and Annie) the night that Roland and Annie had sex. He wants Annie to be more humanlike because he feels more power in controlling another person than he does controlling a robot. Because Annie looks like his ex-wife, Doug can also vicariously control her as he wasn’t able to when they were together. This also confirms that Doug does not demean Annie because she is a robot but because she is a woman within the eyes of society.
Although no one in the novel raises the issue, the sex between Roland and Annie cannot be construed as consensual. Roland coerced Annie into complying with his sexual desire, and because Annie had been programmed to obey humans, she was not equipped to say no. Doug effectively blames Annie for her own victimization, which brings up issues of sexual violence and consent. That Doug does not perceive Annie to have been the victim of Roland’s predatory sexual behavior aligns with his view of Annie as his possession. At the same time, he disregards her programming and believes that she should have been able to stop the encounter. He both blames Annie for willingly cheating on him and is angry at Roland for taking away his beloved object.
That Annie does not understand that she was victimized points to the extent to which she wrestles with her own identity: Even as she progresses along her autodidactic path, there are many moments when she still perceives herself as a piece of submissive technology. Even late in the narrative, Annie focuses on her role as Doug’s servant: “Repentance, obedience. She wills herself to be good again” (151). Although at this point, she has begun to conceive of herself as an intelligent being, she cannot quite break from the idea that Doug is entitled to control her.
Annie deals with Doug’s resentment and emotional distance through a retreat into the world of learning. She teaches herself math and begins to read novels voraciously. This kind of escapism resonates with the way some people respond to unhappy relationships, and her emotional complexity continues to blur the boundaries between artificial and human intelligence.
Annie and Doug begin to attend therapy during these chapters, and their conversations while in their counseling sessions became a key focal point. It is obvious not only that Doug still blames Annie for having sex with Roland but also that his desire for retribution guides his treatment of her. When the therapist points out how problematic that impulse is, Doug’s response is to voice his desire to erase Annie’s memory. He still thinks of her as an object, even as her own intellectual and emotional development has created an even more human consciousness. Annie begins to think about power and humanity during these sessions and realizes that her desire for power is a human trait. The Nature of Artificial Versus Human Intelligence thus remains a key thematic concern during this section, even as Doug remains unable (and unwilling) to see Annie as something approaching human. Moreover, as Annie and Doug try to reconcile, her body no longer responds sexually to his. This, too, seems markedly human, and although Doug does not see it, the seeds have already been planted for Annie to leave him and strike out on her own.
