Stefen’s Bookclub – June

Fools
by Pat Cadigan

I’ve always had a soft spot for the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction, and we’ve read a few of them for the bookclub. Generally when people talk about the genre, names like William Gibson, Bruce Sterling and Neal Stephenson are usually mentioned. At the time however, there were quite a few writers exploring future possibilities and contemporary anxieties writ large. One of my favourites is the US author Pat Cadigan who wrote several books that I would class as cybepunk. Last month as part of the SF Masterworks range Gollancz released her 1992 title, Fools. It’s three sequential narratives set in a world where it’s possible to download an entire personality into your brain to experience the world as they would. In short, the ultimate role-playing experience. The problem begins when the protagonist, an actress who uses the technique as a form of method acting begins to lose track of which part of her thoughts and memories are actually her. It’s a book about identity that is perhaps more relevant now than when it was written given the way so many people compartmentalise their own identities for various online activities. In any event, I think this will be a fun one to talk about.