paperback, 384 pages
Publié 5 mars 2019 par MCD x FSG Originals.
BEFORE: In Bristol’s centre lies the Croft, a digital no-man’s-land cut off from the surveillance, Big Data dependence, and corporate-sponsored, globally hegemonic aspirations that have overrun the rest of the world. Ten years in, it’s become a centre of creative counterculture. But it’s fraying at the edges, radicalising from inside. How will it fare when its chief architect, Rushdi Mannan, takes off to meet his boyfriend in New York City - now the apotheosis of the new techno-utopian global metropolis? AFTER: An act of anonymous cyberterrorism has permanently switched off the Internet. Global trade, travel, and communication have collapsed. The luxuries that characterised modern life are scarce. In the Croft, Mary - who has visions of people presumed dead - is sought out by grieving families seeking connections to lost ones. But does Mary have a gift or is she just hustling to stay alive? Like Grids, who runs the …
BEFORE: In Bristol’s centre lies the Croft, a digital no-man’s-land cut off from the surveillance, Big Data dependence, and corporate-sponsored, globally hegemonic aspirations that have overrun the rest of the world. Ten years in, it’s become a centre of creative counterculture. But it’s fraying at the edges, radicalising from inside. How will it fare when its chief architect, Rushdi Mannan, takes off to meet his boyfriend in New York City - now the apotheosis of the new techno-utopian global metropolis? AFTER: An act of anonymous cyberterrorism has permanently switched off the Internet. Global trade, travel, and communication have collapsed. The luxuries that characterised modern life are scarce. In the Croft, Mary - who has visions of people presumed dead - is sought out by grieving families seeking connections to lost ones. But does Mary have a gift or is she just hustling to stay alive? Like Grids, who runs the Croft’s black market like personal turf. Or like Tyrone, who hoards music (culled from cassettes, the only medium to survive the crash) and tattered sneakers like treasure. The world of Infinite Detail is a small step shy of our own: utterly dependent on technology, constantly brokering autonomy and privacy for comfort and convenience.
A book about what happens when the Internet goes away, yes, but there’s something much more than that: the exploration of humanity as content between advertising, the questions about what happens next post-revolution, the overlapping mysticism and open-source pragmatism, the breathing, beating characters, the class politics woven throughout. I loved every glowing, gripping word.
at the moment I can't read 'dystopian'/too-close-to-reality sci-fi, because.... am tired. only exception is when Maughan is writing, because of the underlying politics which strikes just perfectly.
