The Bar Code Tattoo

Kayla is the protagonist and sole point-of-view character of the novel. At the start of the novel, she is 16 years old, with her 17th birthday just around the corner. She is the daughter of Ashley and Joseph Reed, and she has the “straight brown, cobalt-blue-streaked hair” and the same “hazel eyes and wide mouth” as her father (9, 53). Kayla is a talented artist but is uninterested in mastering the technological and digital skills that are most highly valued in her society. Because of this reticence, she is unable to gain acceptance to university-level art schools or obtain a scholarship because “no art school would award a scholarship to a student weak in data-imaging” (5).

Kayla’s creative side is partially responsible for her unwillingness to conform to the convenience of AI intelligence and digital programming. Both advancements make creators obsolete and require less talent due to the ease of creating digit artwork with new editing software. Kayla’s lack of interest in her society’s advancements comes from experiencing her father’s swift fall into depression and death by suicide due to the negative social effects of the bar code tattoo. Although Kayla feels the pressure to give in to her society’s demands and get the tattoo, she remains a