Gaia's Toys - Hardcover

Ore, Rebecca

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312857810 ISBN 13: 9780312857813

Publisher: Tor Books, 1995

Synopsis

With Gaia's Toys, Ore takes us on a riveting journey to a dark and brooding American future. It's a wicked, dystopic Disneyland: where gene restructuring is the norm and everyone's plugged into their computers (which is where the authorities want them); where if you don't have a job, your only option is to become a welfare drone, your head in the military cyberspace... and your memory a thing of the past; where saving endangered species in micro-eco bubbles has become a fad with intellectuals and the wealthy, but children go hungry in the streets.
And where a group of eco-terrorists have banded together to stop the creation of an insidious new genetic mutation - a weapon that the government will use to rob Americans of their last scrap of freedom.

About this title

From Booklist:

Thanks to its brilliant, macabre vision of America's not-too-distant future, Ore's new novel puts her squarely in the ranks of such leading-edge sf talent as William Gibson and Neal Stephenson. The twenty-first century she imagines brings--along with bioengineered nanoviruses that keep the rich perpetually young and mandatory cyberspace brain hookups for the poor (for human brains, it turns out, are cheaper than computer brains for running menial programs)--a ruthless caste of eco-terrorists whose latest strike wipes out a score of oil refineries with a miniature nuclear bomb. One terrorist named Allison, aka Mattie Higgins, is nabbed before the explosion, interrogated with high-tech brain probes, and cleverly drafted as an undercover infiltrator for the government. Her new objective: to catch an outlaw gene-tweaker who is breeding insects capable of drugging humans into pacifism. Using three ingeniously different points of view, Ore fuses slick and absorbing storytelling with sophisticated speculative science. Carl Hays

From Publishers Weekly:

This ambitious tale of eco-terrorism from the author of Slow Funeral is a sweet and sour mix. Though extremely exciting on the action-adventure level, and rich in ideas of political philosophy, it offers inadequate character motivation and falls short of building a seamless, wholly believable future world. The story binds three main characters. Willie, a "drode head" with a hardwired skull, works for the government and owns a bio-engineered pet mantis; Allison, an eco-terrorist, is captured and turned by the feds after her Green friends dupe her into setting off a baby nuke; Dorcas, the scientist who created the mantis, is trying to design bugs that will be even more ecologically stimulating. Despite bouts of muddy writing, the energy behind Ore's takes on the ecological problems of our near future?including the dangers of overpopulation and uncontrolled technological expansion?render this a vital, thought-provoking novel.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Tor Books
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0312857810
• ISBN 13: 9780312857813
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 316