#dystopia

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I've finished: Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky

I read Cage of Souls after reading Tchaikovsky's 2024 penal colony novel Alien Clay.

It was interesting to view such similar premises that play out so differently.

An authoritarian regime that refuses to acknowledge scientific reality sends its dissidence to a deadly penal colony. The complexity of reality we discover along the way paves the way to a new future.

While Alien Clay is set in a universe where humans colonized space and are exporting their imperialist ideals. Cage of Souls is set at humanities twilight, after it failed to leave for the stars.

In Clay, the focus is on political dissent, dogma and science. In Souls, the dissidents are a mixed bag of the disenfranchised that have run afoul of the elite, each with their own agendas. More like in, City of Last Chances.

I really enjoyed the richness of the …

When artists imagine the future these days, it looks bleak and dark — and actually, fair enough. But for Boomers, it was colorful, shiny, and sometimes sexy — and that's at least partly down to the late Syd Mead, the concept artist who worked on "Star Trek: The Motion Picture," "Tron" and "Blade Runner," and also depicted futuristic vehicles and alien vistas, imbued with optimism rather than evil. Six years after his death, Mead has his first retrospective, Future Pastime. Read more about it in the Art Newspaper's story here, and see it in New York until May 21. Story may be paywalled.

https://flip.it/rehpaC

! On May 3 from 2-2:30pm Eastern, I'll be giving a online talk on by . This talk previews my month-long "Meet The Last Man" module with SPACE (Signum Portals for Adult Continuing Education) via , which is scheduled for June 2025. This is part of the SPACE Showcase day of programming.

Everyone is invited!

Teaser: https://youtu.be/tzV-5T-td38?si=19zzTmQW-W6_w7mG

Info on the May 3 talk: https://blackberry.signumuniversity.org/events/2025-spring-space-showcase/

Pictured (in black and white) is a bust of Mary Shelley with her novel The Last Man and The Mary Shelley Reader anthology from Oxford stacked together in the background.

Keep thinking about writing a dystopian novel that follows a hardcore eco-leftist resistance to a techno-fascist government who don't use any technology after the start of the internet age and are rejected by other factions due to their heavy use of terrorism and armed warfare.

To my delight, my month-long "Meet " module with SPACE (Signum Portals for Adult Continuing Education) via has been confirmed. It will run in June 2025.

This novel is one of the most relevant books we can read right now, and I can't wait to discuss it with students!

Teaser: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2EcVRnhii0

More info: https://blackberry.signumuniversity.org/space/modules/iteration/2011/

Today, in dystopia. This looks like it's directly lifted from a Cory Doctorow novel.

CBS News: DoorDash and Klarna partner to offer an eat now, pay later plan

"...DoorDash customers will have the option either to pay in full, to pay in four equal installments or to postpone payment to "a more convenient time, such as a date that aligns with their paycheck," DoorDash said Thursday in a news release...."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/klarna-doordash-payments/

MoneyWatch DoorDash and Klarna partner to offer an eat now, pay later plan

Fahrenheit 451. By Ray Bradbury.

It’s the future, and your job is to burn books found in people’s homes, as they are illegal; you never questioned this because everyone is fine with this idea since books were replaced long ago with more entertaining visual media, but then something makes you want to read one of these books, and a different kind of flame is lit inside you.

4 of 5 library cats 🐈 🐈 🐈 🔥.

@bookstodon

Book cover illustration featuring a man made of paper that’s on fire

Hear a dramatized adaptation of the dystopian classic, Brave New World, narrated by Aldous Huxley himself! His old-timey, droning voice makes it all the better!

The CBS Radio Workshop was an “experimental dramatic radio anthology series” that aired between 1956 and 1957. It started with style with this gem!

Via @openculture

https://www.openculture.com/2022/03/hear-aldous-huxley-narrate-his-dystopian-masterpiece-brave-new-world.html

I've finished: Scythe by Neal Shusterman

It was recommended as part of a Story Graph reading challenge under the prompt:

" 20. Dystopian Deconstruction (1 added)

Critiques the overused conventions of YA dystopias".

I found it to be a very conventional YA dystopia novel.

I see these prompts a a learning opportunity. If you've read Scythe and can enlighten me as to why it would be considered a diconstruction of YA dystopian conventions, I'd love to hear it. If you agree that it is not a diconstructi9on, can you recommend another novel for this prompt?

Mind you, in this reading challenge Anti YA is an adjacent prompt.

" 19. Anti-YA (2 added)

Challenges traditional YA tropes like the chosen one or insta-love."

I think this discussion will contain spoilers. So it will be continued in the next message with a content warning.

https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/53eeb598-9e44-4392-bcbf-d693e8e3e2b5

@bookstodon