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A review by colossal
Red Moon by Kim Stanley Robinson
2.0
A geopolitical allegorical story using the trappings of mid-21st century colonization of the Moon.
Fred Fredericks, a quantum mechanic, as he arrives at the Chinese moonbase at the Moon's south pole where he gets caught up in an assassination, nearly dying himself. He gets linked up with a pregnant young Chinese woman, Chan Qi, who has her own problems with the authorities. The story follows the two of them as they bounce between the Moon and various places there, China on Earth and back to the Moon, all with the backdrop of the author's wish fulfillment fantasy of eco-techno-Marxist revolution in both China and the USA at the same time.
Fred Fredericks is mildly autistic and insular with very little understanding of China or the Chinese people, even though his business is with China and he can't seem to disengage from China in general. (Pssst. He's a metaphor for the United States.)
Chan Qi is a party princess who's the figurehead leader of a ground-swell new people's revolution. (You'll never guess who she's a metaphor for. Hint: take out the 'Q' in her name and there's an anagram going on.)
The two of them find themselves in similar difficult circumstances and form a co-dependent relationship. (PSSST. IT'S A METAPHOR.)
The two muddle along, threatened at all stages by activity in the world that they had a hand in but have no control over, largely mediated by the general population and emerging new technologies. (DO YOU GET IT YET?! DO YOU??!??! METAPHOR!!)
And all of that gets mixed in with a healthy dose of infodumps on quantum theory, space science and engineering, geopolitics, economics, democracy vs Chinese socialism and in-party politics within China, handily given by an unnamed analyst working on an emergent artificial intelligence.
The story is an absolute mess and even more of a political wish fulfillment fantasy than the previous [b:New York 2140|29570143|New York 2140|Kim Stanley Robinson|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1471618737s/29570143.jpg|49898123]. At no point do the characters transcend their origins as allegories, and the "on-screen" action is both mostly unbelievable and not the most interesting thing happening at the time. I understand the author's political beliefs and I even share many of them, but this is too heavy-handed and poorly executed for even this leftie.
Fred Fredericks, a quantum mechanic, as he arrives at the Chinese moonbase at the Moon's south pole where he gets caught up in an assassination, nearly dying himself. He gets linked up with a pregnant young Chinese woman, Chan Qi, who has her own problems with the authorities. The story follows the two of them as they bounce between the Moon and various places there, China on Earth and back to the Moon, all with the backdrop of the author's wish fulfillment fantasy of eco-techno-Marxist revolution in both China and the USA at the same time.
Fred Fredericks is mildly autistic and insular with very little understanding of China or the Chinese people, even though his business is with China and he can't seem to disengage from China in general. (Pssst. He's a metaphor for the United States.)
Chan Qi is a party princess who's the figurehead leader of a ground-swell new people's revolution. (You'll never guess who she's a metaphor for. Hint: take out the 'Q' in her name and there's an anagram going on.)
The two of them find themselves in similar difficult circumstances and form a co-dependent relationship. (PSSST. IT'S A METAPHOR.)
The two muddle along, threatened at all stages by activity in the world that they had a hand in but have no control over, largely mediated by the general population and emerging new technologies. (DO YOU GET IT YET?! DO YOU??!??! METAPHOR!!)
And all of that gets mixed in with a healthy dose of infodumps on quantum theory, space science and engineering, geopolitics, economics, democracy vs Chinese socialism and in-party politics within China, handily given by an unnamed analyst working on an emergent artificial intelligence.
The story is an absolute mess and even more of a political wish fulfillment fantasy than the previous [b:New York 2140|29570143|New York 2140|Kim Stanley Robinson|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1471618737s/29570143.jpg|49898123]. At no point do the characters transcend their origins as allegories, and the "on-screen" action is both mostly unbelievable and not the most interesting thing happening at the time. I understand the author's political beliefs and I even share many of them, but this is too heavy-handed and poorly executed for even this leftie.