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I'm currently re-reading Cosmonaut Keep by Ken MacLeod, having never got round to finishing the Engines of Light trilogy (of which CK is the first part) and it strikes me that quite a few Barbelites would probably like his stuff (if they don't already).
A lot of it has a cyberpunk edge that's pitched midway between Banks (of whom Mr MacLeod is a good friend) and Gibson, but the whole thing's wrapped in politics. (One of the greatest conceits in The Cassini Division is first contact between socialists and anarcho-capitalists, played out like man's first meeting with extra-terrestrials). There's plenty of hard science and techy in-jokes (he used to be a programmer before he got paid to write about space)- "The familiar Microsoft Windows 2045 image floated up, to be instantly replaced ny a demonically laughing penguin which left the words 'but seriously...' fading on the screen before cutting to the primary interface."
And his characters are rock-solid too. But what interests me is his blend of science and politics.
The Fall Revolution sequence (The Star Fraction, The Stone Canal, The Cassini Division and The Sky Road) are among my favourite sf novels ever, and are interesting in that there are rarely any "bad guys" in what are, ostensibly, thrillers, much of the conflict coming from different well-meaning but fundamentally opposed ideologies. And he has an enthusiasm for the old dream of space travel that it's hard not to get caught up with.
His blog, The Early Days of a Better Nation makes a good read, too- musings on sf, political theory and Scotland.
Does anyone have any thoughts on the guy? If you've never read him, I recommend the Star Fraction whole-heartedly to anyone with even a passing interest in science or politics (I imagine, were he a Barbelite himself, he'd ba a Lab/Switchboard/Head Shop kind of guy). |
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