This is very different from Solaris in tone and topic. Solaris was brooding and rather lonely, whereas this book was frenetic and very crowded. The title---The Futurological Conference---is used as only a device to get us to a dystopia based on hallucinations.
The idea of mind control---very specific mind control---using aerosol drugs is pretty frightening. One section where the main characters were discussing the reason for over population, they noted that everyone thought progress was going well on the space bases because the information they were told included an aerosol for naivety. With no way---and with the drugs no desire---to check, the bases on Jupiter never did, and were never going to, exist.
So, instead of just the standard government pulling the wool over the eyes of the citizens, you have the corporations pulling the the wool over the eyes of the government. Not even the people in charge---or who you think are in charge---know the truth. I guess it is the ultimate in lobbying.
I enjoyed the book, especially the dystopian section, which was quite different from the others I have read. The style was tough to get into at first, but as the story started out so outlandish, I couldn't stop because I wanted to find out just where it would end up.
No comments:
Post a Comment