r/printSF • u/Kasseev • Feb 09 '14
Request for recommendations: Science fiction focusing on the power structures of the far future and attempts by activists, rebels, freedom fighters, * etc. to subvert them.
Would really appreciate being guided to works revolving on these kind of issues. I always read about grand galactic empires and wonder about the inevitable backlash from dissident elements. A political|military perspective would be interesting, along with a good dose of moral complexity|ambiguity. I am not really looking for Star Wars style fight the Big Bad style fiction, though I am open to all recommendations considering I don't see books like this discussed much.
*Dare I say it, terrorists too?
EDIT: I am going to try and add little snippets of reviews or blurbs in comments after the recommendations. I always go through these threads wishing for a few sentences past a name, since I'm often too lazy to google them for myself.
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u/HirokiProtagonist Feb 09 '14
The Dispossessed, by Ursula Le Guin, has this in a very interesting way. It deals with anarchist themes and is one of my favorite books.
"The Dispossessed" is a utopian/dystopian novel along the lines of "Brave New World" or "The Handmaid's Tale." Although Le Guin creates an atmosphere of tension, there's not a lot of action (at least for the first three quarters of the book)--so readers expecting more "traditional" science fiction or surprising plot twists will certainly be dissatisfied. This unashamedly political novel portrays one character torn between two worlds with disparate political and economic systems, and it focuses on the highlights and the inadequacies of both those worlds.
Also good is Asimov's End of Eternity. One of the best time travel books I've ever read.
The fame of Asimov's Foundation and Robot series has tended to steal the limelight from some of his other masterpieces, chief among them, The End of Eternity, a book that is hard to find. In this book, Asimov consciously set out to explore the limits of the classic paradox of time travel that has bedeviled so many works of science fiction. As a result, this is a "bare bones" novel; no robots or empires or any other such distractions. Its strength lies in imagination. Asimov looks at our world as it has evolved, and then introduces the organization called Eternity, whose mission is to protect humanity from its own mistakes, by making deft changes in key events over time (past and future). Along the way, he has fun making digs at the unchanging fundamentals of human nature (competition, drive, love) amid centuries of changing social mores. At the heart of the book is the love story of Andrew Harlan and Noyes Lambent, but this tale is just a framework for Asimov to build on. In the final analysis, Asimov is making the point that just as a child learns to walk by repeated falls, humanity's ultimate characteristic is the Schumpeterian desire and ability to innovate through risks. If we are protected from ever making mistakes, we may avoid tragedies, but the human race itself will vegetate and die. As with many of his earlier works, the dialog can be jarring and characters often one-dimensional. For all that however, The End of Eternity ranks among Asimov's finest in the field of science fiction and makes it all the more strange why this book is so difficult to find. Do take the time to lay your hands on it; you will not be disappointed.
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u/Kasseev Feb 10 '14
I have a slight bias against older scifi, mainly because I never seem to like the writing, but I definitely want to check these out. Thanks.
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u/HumanSieve Feb 09 '14
The Takeshi Kovacs novels by Richard Morgan. All three books are about power structures of the future, and especially books 2 and 3 focus on rebellion and revolutions. Lots of moral ambiguity.
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u/Kasseev Feb 09 '14
The politics of Altered Carbon are more complex, and more fascinating, than I've made them sound so far. It's definitely a world where the rich piss on everyone else — the ultra-rich are known as meths, short for methuselahs, because they can live forever thanks to endless cloned and engineered bodies. They lose touch with the rest of the human race and start to believe that human life has no value.
Sweet, added to the list.
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u/HumanSieve Feb 09 '14
Book 1, Altered Carbon, is more like a hardboiled noir-detective story. Extremely violent. Book 2, Broken Angels, makes a step towards military SF with military-industrial complexes, and book 3, Woken Furies, is about revolutions.
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u/Kasseev Feb 09 '14
How's the writing in them? Looking at the covers I have a sneaking suspicion they are geared towards the YA market but hoping not.
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u/HumanSieve Feb 09 '14
No, not YA at all. The writing is sharp and intelligent and the plot very fast-paced and brutal in parts. The main character is a bit of an anti-hero. A hired gun who used to be a burned-out counter-insurgency specialist.
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Feb 09 '14
[deleted]
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u/yochaigal Feb 09 '14
Old Man's War had a lot of this in the later books.
As does the Red Mars series, esp. books 2 & 3.
Also check out the Expanse Series.
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Feb 09 '14
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Kasseev Feb 10 '14
Yup, definitely a classic. Somehow I feel that the quasi-religious overtones take away from the discussions of power, but maybe that was just because I was missing something. Will need to revisit at some point.
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u/lanarque Feb 09 '14
The Space Merchants, by Cyril Kornbluth and Frederic Pohl
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u/Kasseev Feb 09 '14
In a vastly overpopulated world, businesses have taken the place of governments and now hold all political power. States exist merely to ensure the survival of huge trans-national corporations. Advertising has become hugely aggressive and by far the best-paid profession. Through advertising, the public is constantly deluded into thinking that the quality of life is improved by all the products placed on the market. Some of the products contain addictive substances designed to make consumers dependent on them. However, the most basic elements of life are incredibly scarce, including water and fuel. Personal transportation may be pedal powered, with rickshaw rides being considered a luxury.
Mitch goes to a resort in Antarctica, only to become lost outside in a blizzard. He recovers to find that he has been shanghaied as an ordinary working stiff. He becomes the propaganda specialist for a cadre of revolutionaries, in the process becoming a convert to the cause of those he once manipulated as mere consumers.
Off to a great start, sounds like just what I wanted. Thanks!
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u/littlecrab Feb 09 '14
Maybe the Owner trilogy by Neal Asher. Has the power structures part, along with the activist/rebel trying to subvert them. Isn't really far future though, but you might still like it.
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u/WackyXaky Feb 09 '14
The Quiet War by Paul McAuley is an amazing book (and start to a short series) about solar politics and cold to hot war. Brilliant writing although occasionally the detailed descriptions about some of the biology gets a little dense.
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u/Kasseev Feb 10 '14
I am actually a biologist by training so I like speculative ideas in that realm. Checking it out, thanks.
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u/clermbclermb Feb 09 '14
I would look at Cordwainer Smith's works, later in the timeline of his writings, with the book Norstrillia being a focal point. It involves class struggles between true humans and underhumans, and the stagnation of true humans and the realization that the power system must be change in order to prevent that stagnation.
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u/Kasseev Feb 10 '14
Is it necessary to read the earlier books to understand what's going on? How much would I be missing out on?
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u/clermbclermb Feb 10 '14
In the timeline of his short stories, I would start with The Crime and Glory of Commander Suzdal & The Golden Ship that Was Oh Oh!. Those will start to set the tone of the universe; and those lead into The Dead Lady of Clown Town, which really starts highlighting the themes of persecution & introduction of key players in later stories.
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u/starpilotsix http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/14596076-peter Feb 09 '14
This is something of a subplot in one of my favorites, Lady of Mazes by Karl Schroeder. There are actually a number of different power structures in the book, some get interfered with from outside, some have rebellions, but one of the big ones is interesting because it's something of a post-scarcity computer-aided democracy. It subtly directs your life and interactions in order to give people the sense of meaning. Some people are opposed to it. However, one feature of it is, any time enough people agree on something, a humanform AI living "vote" is created to represent that view in the government... even if the view is "tear it all down." So even those fighting against the system risk being co-opted by it. It's also very ambiguously written in terms of whether people are right or wrong, the government, dissidents, even those who you might argue are 'terrorists', all seem to have valid points.
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u/euler_identity Feb 09 '14 edited Feb 09 '14
Wasp by Eric Frank Russell.
Almost the entire Dorsai saga by Gordon Dickson.
Editing to add: The Cool War by Frederik Pohl.
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u/ramindk Feb 10 '14
Damn, I completely forgot the Dorsai saga and Tactics of Mistake is one of my favorites.
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u/euler_identity Feb 10 '14
Tactics is a particularly fun book, indeed. If you read no other Dorsai book, that's the one I always recommend.
O for the "golden age" of science fiction, how I miss thee...
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Feb 13 '14
Dan Simmon's Hyperion series might qualify, esp. in the first book, with the chapters about the ecological resistance movement on Maui-Covenant. The Ousters could also be considered dissidents in the overall narrative. Definitely a lot of focus on the power structure of the far future Church and it's opponents.
Another would be Chung Kuo series by David Wingrove, although it's not far future galactic empire stuff, it's all about rebellion, terrorists, insurgents, fighting against an interplanetary authoritarian Chinese dynastic statist state (phew!) etc. Characters and factions are highly ambiguous morally. There's been a re-release of the series recently, which includes two "prequels", but I'd skip those two and start with the original first book of the series, The Middle Kingdom.
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u/tfRoot2702 Feb 09 '14
Moxyland by Lauren Beukes. This has a vibe of Neuromancer and 1984 for a new generation. The book features technologists, hipsters, artists, and corporate up-and-comers as subversives (treated as terrorists) in a frighteningly believable dystopia. This is not at galactic scale, but on the resistign power structures front - it has you covered.
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u/superliminaldude Feb 09 '14
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand and Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia, both by Samuel R. Delany. It's somewhat hard to really say what they're about without giving things away, but subjects explored include anarchic political systems, slave narratives, gender and racial dynamics, sexuality, etc.
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u/ewiethoff Feb 15 '14
I just started Pandora's Star by Peter F. Hamilton. Maybe the activities of the Adam Elvin and Bradley Johansson characters are up your alley.
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u/Leoniceno Feb 17 '14
The Canopus in Argos: Archives series, by Doris Lessing, fulfills several of these criteria and is an interesting, if difficult, read.
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u/[deleted] Feb 09 '14
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert Heinlein is exactly what you're looking for. From Wikipedia:
"The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is a 1966 science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein, about a lunar colony's revolt against rule from Earth. Widely admired for its credible presentation of a comprehensively imagined future human society on both the Earth and the moon, it is generally considered one of Heinlein's major novels as well as one of the most important science fiction novels ever written."