climate, cyberpunk, tech

Cory Doctorow is nothing if not prolific, but unless you count "The Rapture of the Nerds," his collaboration with Charlie Stross (which I don't), I really haven't been interested in the sort of near-term polemical thrillers that are his bread and butter. However, when Doctorow decided to tackle future American political strife my thought was, okay, challenge accepted.

For one thing, this is kind of old-school speculative fiction in that it's very "ideas first," only the ideas that Doctorow is dealing with are of the sort that the people who wish for SF like it used to be written don't want to engage with. This is as the characters in this novel are well up to their waists in the "Long Emergency" of catastrophic climate change, where some people like protagonist Brooks Palazzo factor this into their future, and some, like his toxic grandfather, are stewing over what they see as the end times. Which is to say that while Doctorow's characterization is fine, they do sometimes seem mostly like the tools of a polemic; though since I expected to be polemicized this is more of a feature than a bug.

On the whole my experience with this novel was positive, but my biggest gripe is having Palazzo's grandfather conveniently die early in the book, with his place being taken by various surrogates; to me this seemed like a cop-out. To really engage with the conflicts in question would have meant Doctorow dealing with the inner life of the future MAGA "bitter ender." I know that's a tough task, but I think it would have resulted in a better novel; a lot of the time this felt like a survival-horror game where our plucky band of adventurers have to deal with an escalating series of "bosses" who are mostly inscrutable. ( )

This novel is set in a world damaged by climate change, and afflicted by the polarized politics that priorizes the rights of the occupants of the wealthier countries, and global financial elites over the moral claims of people displaced by climate change. It is polemical and didactic. Its young characters are examples of correct ideals and practices. It is, it appears, among Mr. Doctorow's SF novels written for youg adults. ( )

What you expect from a Cory Doctorow novel is a political manifesto where right-on characters who all sound the same deliver inspiring lectures to each other about decentralised computing or collective action, and there will also be lovingly described cooking including in this one a short recipe for shakshuka I want to try out. Normally I give up about halfway through, but this one was surprisingly moving and hammered out some optimism for a time when it seems like the global consensus is to procrastinate deaiing with (waves hands around). ( )

Wow, there is a lot going on in this book! I loved it from early on because there's some great worldbuilding on what an "optimistic" near future could look like, with a Jobs Guarantee that connects people with work that actually helps their communities (caregiving, solar panel maintenance, etc.), lots of people working on relocating coastal cities inland, and factories that only run when there's surplus solar power. But that's just the beginning, as the protagonist has a bunch of conversations with different people about how to fix the world. And then there's the major conflict, which is fought in courtrooms and with creative activism and in the court of public opinion. And also a bunch of cool people living their lives and cooking delicious food for each other and falling in love. There are no easy answers, even by the end, but there's a whole lot to think about. ( )