I finished reading a book. Which for me is saying quite a lot. This time I finished reading After the Revolution by Robert Evans.
These days have a dozen or so books that I am “reading” at any one time, so actually finishing one is quite remarkable. This book is remarkable too, for a few reasons.
About Robert Evans
First off, it’s a book published by an anarchist publishing house called AK Press. They’re completely democratic and worker-owned. They also publish about twenty books every year. They’re really cool and you should check them out.
The second is that it’s a book by Robert Evans, who you may know for his work as a journalist, his multiple podcasts, or his time at Cracked.com. Or maybe even from his other book, A Brief History of Vice.
This is Evans’ first foray into fiction and it doesn’t disappoint. If you have listened to his podcast “Behind the Bastards” you can tell that he has read a lot of fiction and non-fiction for both fun and profit.
Setting and Characters
After the Revolution takes place in a post-USA North America, where the former states have balkanized into a handful of smaller states, each of them experimenting with different ways of living. Kind of. The most direct successor of the USA, the AmFed, seems like a pretty safe place to live but also pretty dull. The moving city of posthuman nomads lovingly named “Rolling Fuck” where alcohol and narcotics flow freely at all times of the day seems a lot more fun.
This book is set primarily in the failed libertarian experiment that is the Republic of Texas. It’s not a very stable polity. The Free City of Austin and the Secular Defense Force (SDF) are the main players were care about in terms of sane governments. The other is the Heavenly Kingdom, a group of christofascist militias with an excellent command of social media and propaganda, and also a willingness to shell civilian neighborhoods into submission at the first sign of resistance. At the start of the book this conflict has been simmering for years, but that is about to change. That brings us to the three POV characters we get to follow.
Manny – a fixer who was born and raised in Austin. Manny makes a living by making introductions for foreign journalists. He has dreams of saving up to move to a less violent part of the world, like Europe.
Roland – a posthuman combat vet with almost no memory of his past. Roland prefers to spend his days ingesting as many drugs as he can get his hands on. He does this to dull his enhanced senses while he works very hard to avoid killing people. He is very good at killing people and is nearly unkillable himself.
Sasha – a nice studious girl attending high school in the AmFed. She became radicalized online and even fell in love with a soldier fighting for the Heavenly Kingdom. She’s been hiding her allegiance from her parents for two years while she prepares to emigrate to the Heavenly Kingdom and work to see God’s will done on Earth.
The Verdict
Now, I’m just going to say it, I really enjoyed this book. I don’t normally take an interest in stories that fall into the twenty-minutes-into-the-future category but honestly, that’s a mistake on my part. With the exception of some especially magical nanobot healing, Evans created a setting that feels real and not too far away from the present.
In the acknowledgments, Evans says that this is a book mainly about trauma, and we are presented with a lot of characters who are all dealing with trauma in different ways. What I think he did so masterfully, was craft a future America that could feel real and relatable, no doubt thanks to his experience as a war correspondent in the Middle East. Evans does a phenomenal job portraying scenes we expect to see on the news overseas as taking place on a continent more familiar to us. The book challenges us to otherize the characters but we can’t help but empathize with them.
I think this is a really great book. Robert Evans did a fantastic job of envisioning a future where all the bad things that we don’t like to imagine happening here actually could. Easily 5/5, especially when the novel stands on its own. The ending leaves room for possible sequels but doesn’t require them. If you’re hesitant about buying a copy for yourself you can listen to the book online. But I really recommend buying a copy if you can afford it to support a smaller press.
Stay tuned for a series of reviews of Brian McClellan’s new book; In The Shadow Of Lightning.
Your writing has a positive impact.
Your point of view caught my eye and was very interesting. Thanks. I have a question for you.
I don’t think the title of your article matches the content lol. Just kidding, mainly because I had some doubts after reading the article.
For context for this reply I inform you I don’t know you and just came across your post here because I was confused about some of the grography in After The Revolution, I previously didn’t know about your other reviews and only came to know them in trying to comprehend your point of view.
In response for you not giving books that are in the “20 minutes in the future” category a chance, I have to agree with you.
It all comes back to suspension of disbelief.
In learning about this concept “20 minutes in the future” I learned about Phlebotinum and immediately The Expanse came to my mind, I looked at some of your other posts and saw you reviewed The Expanse and called it Hard Scifi.
I think you are misinformed about The Expanse being Hard Scifi in your other posts.
The Expanse is social scifi, people think it is hard scifi because it’s writers show some understanding of classical physics, while employing the phlebotium of the epstein drive to work around classical physics. The Expanse uses concepts like the belter’s using sign to communicate in vacuum space suit with no RF audio comms, and how that enters their day to day vocal comms in face-to face atmospheric conversation.
That is social scifi stuff!
As a lover of science The Expanse’s use of acceleration approximation of gravity is lovely and much appreciated, but as a lover of social scifi everything else about the book is fantastic and spot on, even if written by two authors who are publishing books meant for profit and enjoyment of a mass market that has a certain kind of education.
I love The Expanse because I am a social justice activist and anarchist with trauma and I enjoy social scifi and understand classical physics. I have met people like Marko Inaros, Fred Johnson, Julie Mao, Anderson Dawes and James Holden.
The Expanse has some huge apparent blind spots and it can’t not. It was written to be consumed by American readers who have been indoctrinated with American propaganda. You can tell a lot about someone, especially an American by what the word “freedom” means to them, and also what they claim it does.
Holden is a seemingly (according to the narrative) oblivious lib who claims to but does understand the power fame has, and starts out not afraid to use it in expedient ways to get what he wants. The cost to others is death and destruction because the human world is made up of other people who also have types of power. He later becomes outwardly cynical and jaded, I don’t know if he ever learns any lessons. People around him continously try to communicate to him the power(the trust the public has in him) and violence he is using against others to causes harm. People like Naomi Nagata continously try to communicate lessons to him, he sees her as a terrorist but she is his partner and lover? The narrative might be interpreted by many is that Naomi’s judgement is clouded by love and trust, and it is in a lot of ways. But she is also trying to survive and look out for her own interests.
How is this hard scifi?
Calling it hard scifi is insulting to the story and missing the point.
I personally feel that words are one of the most violent things you can do to others aside from actions, and besides that I love media and a good story, go figure.
Things like Robert using the acronym in the book SDF harms my suspension of disbelief because to me SDF is Syrian Defense Forces because I know more about Rojava than what people are calling bad books these days.
I am really sorry to come off as aggressive, I am only communicating to you because I want you to understand. I love The Expanse and people describing it as hard scifi whilst also using phrases like 20 mintutes into the future is a low blow. I don’t know if you called it that because you are also making words trying to appeal to a larger audience, I don’t know your intent and I can’t. People hardly know their own.
For my safety I leave no means by which you could ever reach me and I probably will never look back at this blog. If my words are of value to you pay it forward in your writing in the future
I recommend more Ursula K Leguin
You would probably also enjoy Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie.
I warn you that it includes characters with they/them pronouns, some people refuse to read any books that include “pronouns” (as they call it). If you are one of these people Ancillary Justice would help you a lot if you gave it a chance.
The Epstein Drive is literally phlebotinum created by “A great man” (Epstein) who had ambition and drive, (Italic)The Epstein Drive(/Italic).
The Expanse is “Hard Scifi”
I’m so sorry I am being so mean, I am just struggling to stay alive every single day here and I am so amused.