Imagining Abrupt Climate Change : Terraforming Earth review:5 stars (Writing Beyond Genre) - Most of what Kim Stanley `Stan' Robinson writes is classified as science fiction. His works also often wear the label `literary,' but I read a little bit of everything, including unliterary science fiction, so I think dispensing with labels would be appropriate at this point. Stan's novels are the works of a writer with broad interests and a penchant for accuracy, so getting into his head through the Amazon Shorts titled "Imagining Abrupt Climate Change: Terraforming Earth" was lots of fun. In this 20 page electronic downlaod, Stan lets us in on the genesis of his current project, a near future trilogy [including Forty Signs Of Rain and the soon to be released Fifty Degrees Below] that has the Earth descending into a sudden cold period. He relates connections to his personal interests and two previous novels [Green Mars from the Mars trilogy and the stand alone Antarctica, which he wrote after being part of the Antarctic Artists and Writers' program]. There are several methods for reading the piece, and other than a few typos, I really enjoyed "Imagining Abrupt Climate Change" and look forward to pieces by other authors in the Amazon Shorts series - a series I hope is long term and will not abruptly end.5 stars (Nobody makes 'boring science' as interesting as KSR does) - I'm of the belief one should never pass up the chance to read anything Mr. Robinson publishes. His prose is like the crispest poetry, but without poetry's pretentiousness. This essay, like his fiction, presents theories without shying away from the difficult task of giving the reasons why they're worth considering -- even when it means explaining concepts from paleontology, climatoly, and other similarly unglamorous sciences. It is an engaging read that will help those eagerly awaiting "Fifty Degrees Below" bide their time until that novel's release while also helping to understand the author's motivation and thought process.
Even if you've avoided Mr. Robinson's works because you're put off by books that get called 'Hard Sci-Fi' in reviews, this essay is a perfect example of what sets his writing apart. Frankly, aside Robert A. Heinlein, I've been bored to tears by most writers who pick up that tag. Mr. Robinson, like Mr. Heinlein, has always held my interest because he has a strong moral voice and his fiction makes an argument that is organic to whatever story he is telling. Anwering the question, why another trilogy?, Mr. Robinson writes: "Some stories just need lots of pages to tell right. I wanted to describe what such the experience of abrupt climate change would feel like, from the point of view of a number of individuals. I wanted also to describe how science works in the real world, today, and how it relates to the worlds of power politics, capital, and daily life. I wanted to explore some ideas about how certain Buddhist concepts might apply to the situation, and help us think our way through it. Because in the end this environmental crisis, and the possibility of catastrophic abrupt climate change, is being brought on because of the way we live now; and the way we live is formed by the values we share." The connection he points to between cultural values and their impact on individual lives as well as on the world as a whole, is intensely compelling; it is his ability to weave scientific and moral investigation into an entertaining dramatic structure that makes him, I believe, one of the most important writers of end of the last century and the beginning of this one.
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