Paperback, 220 pages
English language
Published March 26, 2021 by Independently Published.
An antimeme is an idea with self-censoring properties ; an idea which, by its intrinsic nature, discourages or prevents people from spreading it.
Antimemes are real. Think of any piece of information which you wouldn't share with anybody, like passwords, taboos and dirty secrets. Or any piece of information which would be difficult to share even if you complex equations, very boring passages of text, large blocks of random numbers, and dreams... But anomalous antimemes are another matter entirely. How do you contain something you can't record or remember? How do you fight a war against an enemy with effortless, perfect camouflage, when you can never even know that you're at war? Welcome to the Antimemetics Division. No, this is not your first day.
I did not know the SCP Wiki nor the content of the book. Somewhere here on bookwyrm I was intrigued by the title. I really liked the musings on memory, the connection to oneself, but also on institutional memory. Recommened for every science fiction fan!
Fun and quick to read; dense with concepts and twists that are amusing to think on. The speculations on memory, attention, personal and institutional knowledge, trust, social communication, etc. are sometimes unsettling to consider, sometimes funny, sometimes dreadful.
It may be said to lack a solid through-line, a single character or path that can be traced from beginning to end. That may make it feel even more like a cascade of neat ideas than a story.
And, man, it doesn't end very strongly. It doesn't wrap up in a way that's, uh, worthy of its funny, playful, disquieting concepts and set-pieces. Instead, it ends like an animé.
This was a wild read. I didn't know about the SCP wiki before, I found this book by chance via a Mastodon review someone posted. It sounded interesting enough, a little bit like the John Dies At The End novels, maybe without the humor.
The premise of ideas invading human space and these "beings" (if you can call them that) being all around us, just invisible, is pretty interesting. Deliberately purging your memory so these ideas cannot invade your brain while simultaneously trying to solve the problem of how to save humankind, even more so. An enjoyable read if you like sci-fi with more than a touch of horror mixed in.
Unnerving and fragmentary, very satisfying exploration around questions of memory, trust, and institutional decay.
This was a great read. If SCP wiki is at all something you like, you'll like this.
Mind bending cosmic horror that's reminiscent of the laundry files and towards the end, COVID.
It's nice to find science fiction with a novel conceit that's delivered as well as this one. Each chapter builds on the previous until we're through the looking glass. By the nature of the topic it has plenty of opportunity to talk about the importance of memory, though I feel like it only scratches the surface of the setting.
Got me hooked from the very first page.
Got to about 40% with this one. I don’t regret it, I really enjoyed the first part of this. It felt like Severance (the show), the Matrix, and even Outer Worlds (the game) at times. Fun and intriguing.
But after a while it felt like it had run its course. The additions to the concept were less interesting. So I’m fine to just stop here and say I had a good time with what I read.
The normal world carries on around us, and we are all oblivious to the world ending horrors that constantly seek to reshape reality. If only there was an organisation dedicated to securing, containing and protecting us? If there was, I'm sure they would have an antimemetics division to deal with those pesky cognitohazards. Or would they?
So, yeah, definitely Lovecraftian in many ways: in magnitude (this is end-of-the-world horror, not pedestrian handful-of-teens-in-the-woods); in intention (no impersonal asteroids or supernovae, we’re talking pure directed malevolence); in complexity; and, most importantly, in creativity—the ideas developed here are really clever.
Unfortunately, I’ve never cared for Lovecraft. Even as a teen, before I learned what a racist PoS he was, I found his stories tedious. Like, okay, I’ve got this great idea for a concept, let’s see if I can completely kill it in development. This book was (unlike Lovecraft) actually quite good, well written, thought-provoking, enjoyable... it just tried too hard to work with ideas that can’t pan out. (I won’t go into details or spoilers. It just doesn’t add up. Not the motivations, nor the background, and least of all the science.) There are just some ideas, like impromptu hitchhiking to South America or coating your lover in …
So, yeah, definitely Lovecraftian in many ways: in magnitude (this is end-of-the-world horror, not pedestrian handful-of-teens-in-the-woods); in intention (no impersonal asteroids or supernovae, we’re talking pure directed malevolence); in complexity; and, most importantly, in creativity—the ideas developed here are really clever.
Unfortunately, I’ve never cared for Lovecraft. Even as a teen, before I learned what a racist PoS he was, I found his stories tedious. Like, okay, I’ve got this great idea for a concept, let’s see if I can completely kill it in development. This book was (unlike Lovecraft) actually quite good, well written, thought-provoking, enjoyable... it just tried too hard to work with ideas that can’t pan out. (I won’t go into details or spoilers. It just doesn’t add up. Not the motivations, nor the background, and least of all the science.) There are just some ideas, like impromptu hitchhiking to South America or coating your lover in whipped cream, that are better just left to the imagination.
The cover and summary don't mention this, but on page one you find out that this is a book in the SCP mythos. SCP is a collaboratively created fictional universe involving a "Foundation" with mind boggling resources that protects an unknowing world from supernatural horrors.
In fact, the first chapter is the relatively well known SCP 055, and the rest of the story is an extension of 055's ideas.
The problem with being part of a shared universe like SCP though is that it's not clear what background reading you need to do to understand what the rules are. The book is mostly self-explanatory but then around 3/4 of the way in a wild new element is introduced that takes the story from low fantasy firmly into high fantasy territory. It definitely sticks the landing though.
There is a big central mystery but we don't get much of our characters …
The cover and summary don't mention this, but on page one you find out that this is a book in the SCP mythos. SCP is a collaboratively created fictional universe involving a "Foundation" with mind boggling resources that protects an unknowing world from supernatural horrors.
In fact, the first chapter is the relatively well known SCP 055, and the rest of the story is an extension of 055's ideas.
The problem with being part of a shared universe like SCP though is that it's not clear what background reading you need to do to understand what the rules are. The book is mostly self-explanatory but then around 3/4 of the way in a wild new element is introduced that takes the story from low fantasy firmly into high fantasy territory. It definitely sticks the landing though.
There is a big central mystery but we don't get much of our characters (or the reader) being in contention with it so much as them just bumping against it. Also we don't get very much information from inside the characters (in fact, it's not always clear who the POV character is from scene to scene.) I would have appreciated a bit more of that; I think that because the style is ultimately related to creepypasta the goal is to make the reader fill in the feelings with their own fear and doubt.
The message, setup, and especially the ending and lingering questions feel very current, but left me wanting a bit more spelled out-not the mysterious parts, but the mundane parts.
If you're a fan of Control or Primer you may enjoy the sf elements or the horror.
If you like Charles Stross's "Atrocity Archives" or Doctor Who's "The Silence" story arc, you're going to love "There Is No Antimemetics Division".
It explores the idea of what would an anti-meme war look like. I understand that the story was originally serialized on a blog, but it fits together pretty well. The final act was great, but just shy of mind-blowing.
I give 5 stars sparingly, but I knew this deserved one just 50 pages in. Overall, a great addition to my new sci-fi canon, because this story stays with me. I think about it during the day, and I feel like it shifts my perspective in an interesting way. I intended to ship it to my fellow-sci-fi-loving mom after I was done, but it's got more Lovecraftian gore and body horror than she'd like.
Perfection
This book is an explosion of ideas, astounding and obvious and transformative and crazy and valid. And the people are people, and intensely human through it all.
It feels odd to say that this is the best piece of science fiction I've ever read, both because how could that not be hyperbole, and because "science fiction" at the same time doesn't do it justice.
But there it is: this is the best piece of science fiction I've ever read.
No doubt that's partly because it happens to fit my personal tastes and interests so very perfectly.
But also, it's just that good.
https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/antimemetics-division-hub.