A political novel written in 1935 that’s prescient about how an authoritarian regime could actually take power in the United States. Though it begins with a democratic victory, it soon becomes a “corporatist” regime with its own paramilitary force called Minute Men. Through the struggles of Doremus Jessup, a liberal, we see the journey downhill. The references to real life personalities might require some research, but a great read nevertheless.
An absolute treasure if you’re even remotely interested in science fiction. The stated objective of the book is diversity, and it does justice to it on many fronts – non-English writings, the setting in terms of geography, gender, sub-genres – dystopian, alien encounters, space operas, post-apocalypse, and even satire. 105 stories spanning 1160 pages, this book definitely needs to be on your shelf!
Imagine AI as a phenomenon with a singular memory that traces its origins to its current state – Speak is almost that. Through various, very interesting narrators across time – from Mary Bradford, who is making her way across the ocean to Massachusetts in the 17th century to Alan Turing to Stephen Chinn, tech whizkid and the inventor of the babybot, and a few more – we follow the evolution of thoughts which continue to reside inside the AI. The narrative may not throw light on causality, but is poignant and ironic because it conveys what it means to be human through an AI and the flawed humans who worked on it.
The first book in The Alchemy Wars trilogy, the series can broadly be classified as speculative fiction and deserves the high praise it got from George RR Martin. Religion, robotics, AI and free will, set in the early 1900s, is an extremely intriguing premise, and the book delivers an action-packed thriller that goes a notch higher thanks to philosophical debates.
I associated Michael Crichton only with Jurassic Park. It was only thanks to Westworld that I even realised that he was really prolific. It then took a “science fiction must-read” list for me to finally get to this book. It’s one of his earlier works, and I found the premise very interesting. Though there is an extra terrestrial “invasion” involved, it’s not the run-of-the-mill advanced spaceship kind. That does not mean that humans don’t get killed off though. This interesting plot, reasonably well fleshed-out characters and a gripping pace makes it a must-read.