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Who?
Who? | Algis Budrys
2 posts | 2 read | 2 to read
Set against a backdrop of Cold War paranoia, this futuristic novel about identity and technology is one of the unrecognized classics of SF (Locus). East and West have fused into separate superstates known as the Allied National Government (ANG) and the Soviet International Bloc (SIB). As the Cold War rages, brilliant scientist Lucas Martino works on a top-secret project known only as K-Eighty-eight that could alter the balance of world power. The project goes horribly awry at an Allied research facility near the Soviet border, and Martino is abducted. After several months of tense negotiations, he returns severely injured from the lab explosion, and under pressure from America, undergoes extensive reconstructive surgery. He has a mechanical arm. His polished metal skulla kind of craniofacial prosthesiscontains few discernable features. Several of his internal organs are artificial. While his fingerprints are identified as belonging to Lucas Martino, they could be the result of transplant. Is he the real Martino? Or a technologically altered imposter sent by Americas enemies for the purpose of spying and infiltration? Tasked with uncovering the truth, ANG Security Chief Shawn Rogers makes some shocking discoveries. Narrated in chapters alternating between Rogers and Martino, Who? poses existential questions about the human condition.
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Bookwomble
Who? | Algis Budrys
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A thoughtful book about identity and state authority disguised as a sci-fi/cold-war-thriller mash-up. I was listening to a news report yesterday about one of the Windrush Generation: his parents were invited to Britain from Jamaica when he was 8; he's gone to school, worked and paid tax, married and had children in the UK. 50 years after coming here, under Theresa May's "hostile environment", the Home Office declares him "illegal". ??

Bookwomble Required to prove his identity and right to exist, the documents he produces are declared inadequate, the witness statements of employers, friends, and his wife are disregarded. He's imprisoned without trial in a detention centre, answering questions that cannot satisfy an authority determined not to believe him. This is the heart of Budrys's book, written in 1958. What a sorry state of affairs we find ourselves in today. 6y
Aimeesue I am so heartbroken for all of us. What a state the world is in these days. 6y
Bookwomble @Aimeesue It can feel like we're sleepwalking into oblivion, but I think there are enough people of good intent and good heart to make an awakening, though whether I'll live long enough to see it is another matter 😉. Although I can be of a rather melancholic disposition, I've also a tendency towards optimism 😁 6y
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Aimeesue @Bookwomble I'd like to believe that, and I think most people think that they're good themselves, at the very least. Watching what's happening in the US right now is astounding. It's not even the white supremacists' nonsense, because that's always been there; it's the lack of "good" people saying nothing that truly worries me. (edited) 6y
Bookwomble @Aimeesue I think it was Einstein who said that in order for evil to flourish it requires only that good people do nothing. 6y
Aimeesue @Bookwomble Exactly why it frustrates me. I don't understand how people can remain silent in the face of all this hate and the immoral actions of this administration. It's baffling. I, of course, never shut up about it. I can't. (edited) 6y
Bookwomble @Aimeesue And shouldn't ❤ 6y
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Bookwomble
Who? | Algis Budrys
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What's not to love about a book with a man with a metal head on the cover? Guess I'll find out soon enough, one way or the other!

#cyborg #cyborgs

Leftcoastzen 😄 6y
12 likes1 comment