The Future

I enjoyed her previous book, The Power, but thought it seemed like it needed more finishing work, a bit rushed to publication. This book is so much better in my mind. It brings Alderman up to the level of the Crichton's future minded works. I got about 60 pages into it, just enjoying it, then realized I liked it enough to recommend it to one of the book clubs I'm in, and then I was putting stickies in it to mark the pages of things I really wanted to come back to for discussion. There are well over 50 stickies in it!

One thing that will irritate some people is that it jumps around in time to relay events. It might be Martha's childhood, or anytime for one of a couple of people during about a three year span. And at the end of the book, it jumps forward a few years, and keep reading after the Acknowledgments - there's a few pages about the far future.

Now that the irritating part is dealt with - Alderman did a great job thinking about societal impacts of technology, what tech might be available in the sort of near future, how tech can be manipulated, and the psychology of the billionaire narcissists (can anyone say Elon Musk?). The use of religion and cults is well done.

In some ways, it reminds me of The Ministry for the Future by Robinson. Both of these books look at the dire situation we have put ourselves and the climate in, and they find a way to confront it, and find a way forward.

Fiction can be simply entertainment, but the best fiction is entertainment that pushes us to confront issues in society and inspires us to think forward and find a way to make a difference. Alderman has accomplished that.

“The Future” by Naomi Alderman is a cynical commentary on the social dynamics of contemporary society. While all science fiction does this at its core, Naomi Alderman’s take is particularly focused on the consequences of the worst of us playing out their worst ideas. It is dark and disturbing in parts and should come with trigger warnings for almost every subject imaginable. The core premise is fascinating and relevant. However, the flow felt disjointed in parts. Perhaps that start and stop flow is used by Alderman to represent the fractured in our society. At other moments, the flow leaned too much into the doomsday prepper trope. My other frustration was that Alderman gives us characters who may be intentionally hard to connect to. These faults in the book make it hard to form a vested interest in the outcome, which made me want to put it back on the shelf at times. The middle is also a bit drab but accelerates into a compelling story near the end. I wonder how much the narrative could have been improved with some thinning down of characters and plot lines. All that said, the novel is timely given the re-ignited hatred for greedy billionaires and technocrats. Certain qualities about it reminded me of Kurt Vonnegut’s “Cat’s Cradle.” Alderman also throws in a satisfying twist at the end that will satisfy the appetites of anyone in the “ eat the rich” camp. Kudos to Alderman for constructing a world where someone stands up to the oligarchs. While not perfect, “The Future” is a stirring fantasy about one way we may save ourselves.

I INHALED 80% of this in two days. Addictive and quick moving with a wild ending. THE EMAIL AT THE END THOUGH. I am beggggggging for a sequel.

Read an ARC. Need it to be published so I can actually talk to someone about it.

Strange and compelling. This book struggles with technology and its impact on human survival. Reading the server entries is a bit distracting in the beginning, but it makes sense as the book continues. I definitely looked at the tech I use daily and its impact on my daily life.