For Human Use is about dating, with a side of social norm collapse. by Suzette Smith For Human Use, the debut novel by Sarah G. Pierce, is both about and not about a dating app for dead bodies. The story itself follows the rollout o f a new “swiping app” (dubbed Liv) that allows users to scroll through profiles of corpses, which they can then have delivered. Pierce launches us into this notion via a chaotic text conversation between the story’s anxious antihero Tom Williamson and another senior partner at the equity firm where he works. “Your autocorrect keeps typing ‘dead bodies,’” Tom writes, incredulously. But it isn’t a typo. The service’s slimy founder Auden White is pitching Tom’s boss for investment. Wearing a black t-shirt and charcoal washed jeans, Auden spouts empty platitudes, like “spending time alone with a person who’s dead is a profound emotional event.” And even more patronizingly, “it’s okay if Liv makes you uncomfortable.” Auden brings to mind several tech entrepreneurs willing to sacrifice society for their megalomaniacal visions. His business plans are boilerplate allegories for subsidized start-ups—who cares if the thing makes profit as long as it occupies headlines? Tom functions as a vehicle for reader outrage. While morally gray enough to work at an equity firm in the first place, he has the foresight to worry that a dating app for corpses could not only bring down the firm but get them all “dragged in front of Congress.” In an interview, Pierce told the Mercury she based Tom on her husband, joking: “For a lot of people on their first book, it’s helpful to be living with your protagonist.” She fondly remembers that on their first date, he came straight from work and immediately launched into a scathing rant about his dysfunctional office. Fiery monologues bonded the pair, and although Pierce had never considered writing a novel before this one—she’s a photographer and has spent much of her career in the art world—her husband encouraged her to try a writing class. “Because he really enjoyed my rants,” she said. If Pierce’s husband is Tom, does that make her the story’s female lead, Auden White’s stepsister Mara Reed? “Definitely not,” Pierce replied, before questioning if Mara is even a main character in the book. “This book is about Tom and Auden,” she said. Readers who want practicality in their science fiction concepts won’t find that here. There's never a real nuts and bolts discussion of how Liv operates. The service is a satire of start-up culture, as much a work of horror as it is speculation. On the periphery of the action, the book is full of delivery people trying to fit human-sized boxes into elevators. In a common aside, characters mention that their dead matches leak. For Human Use is very plainly about dating, with a side of social norm collapse. Pierce is cleverly commenting on one-sided relationships where you want someone around, but don’t want to treat them like a person. This novel is 448 pages of marvelous satire on the ways humans try to rationalize that.  For Human Use hits shelves on Tues Feb 10. ...read more read less