Julian

Ever wondered how life would be like post-Oil? I do quite a bit, especially every time I see a new service station being built, like the one being built right now near my house. Will we adjust our lives gracefully, or descend to total chaos overnight? That’s what drew me into buying and reading Julian Comstock: A History of 22^nd-Century America by Hugo-winner Robert Charles Wilson, published by my favorite publisher Tor Books.

America in the late 22^nd century is a feudal society with a fratricidal (among other things) hereditary President and an all-powerful church. The Dominion aims at establishing a ‘perfect’ Christian (read Dominion) Kingdom on all of earth in order to one day commune directly with Heaven. I particularly like the part about the origin of the indentured class, i.e. slaves:

“Refugees from the Fall of the Cities traded the only goods they possessed – their hands, their hearts, and their votes – for food and shelter in a difficult time.
...
The commitment doesn’t vanish simply because a man has had the bad luck to die. If a man’s possessions pass by right to his survivors, so do his obligations.”

Doesn’t take much to go back to slavery, does it?

Cory Doctorow did a nice, short review of Julian Comstock at Boing Boing.