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The Unincorporated Man
The Unincorporated Man is a provocative social/political/economic novel that takes place in the future, after civilization has fallen into complete economic collapse. This reborn civilization is one in which every individual is incorporated at birth, and spends many years trying to attain control over his or her own life by getting a majority of his or her own shares. Life extension has made life very long indeed.
Now the incredible has happened: a billionaire businessman from our time, frozen in secret in the early twenty-first century, is discovered and resurrected, given health and a vigorous younger body. Justin Cord is the only unincorporated man in the world, a true stranger in this strange land. Justin survived because he is tough and smart. He cannot accept only part ownership of himself, even if that places him in conflict with a civilization that extends outside the solar system to the Oort Cloud. People will be arguing about this novel and this world for decades.
479 pages, Hardcover
First published March 31, 2009
193 people are currently reading
3604 people want to read
About the author
Dani Kollin
11 books179 followersI'm an accidental science fiction author.
A few years back, broke, desperate and living with my wife and three kids at my in-laws, I decided to get together with my brother, Eytan and write a book. Mind you I had no idea how to go about this but I did know that Eytan had some great ideas and little tenacity and I had a lot of tenacity and a gift for knowing how to turn great ideas into a marketable ones. I applied my advertising copywriter skill set (word craftsmanship and reader empathy) to the one idea of Eytan's I felt was strongest and then together we created an outline, basic plot points and an extrapolated world built on that initial concept. 8 years later our first book, The Unincorporated Man, hit the shelves. It went on to win the 2010 Prometheus Award for Best Science Fiction novel of the year and the three books that followed in its wake were also nominated, one even making the finals. Happy to say the series has also found a warm welcome here at goodreads.com.
Re: me. My hobbies include roadbike riding, surfing and reading.
A few years back, broke, desperate and living with my wife and three kids at my in-laws, I decided to get together with my brother, Eytan and write a book. Mind you I had no idea how to go about this but I did know that Eytan had some great ideas and little tenacity and I had a lot of tenacity and a gift for knowing how to turn great ideas into a marketable ones. I applied my advertising copywriter skill set (word craftsmanship and reader empathy) to the one idea of Eytan's I felt was strongest and then together we created an outline, basic plot points and an extrapolated world built on that initial concept. 8 years later our first book, The Unincorporated Man, hit the shelves. It went on to win the 2010 Prometheus Award for Best Science Fiction novel of the year and the three books that followed in its wake were also nominated, one even making the finals. Happy to say the series has also found a warm welcome here at goodreads.com.
Re: me. My hobbies include roadbike riding, surfing and reading.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 501 reviews
May 14, 2009
This novel offers a really interesting and innovative SF concept: in the future, every person is incorporated upon birth. Twenty percent of the shares go to the parents, five percent goes to the government, the rest can be sold by the owner for education, possessions and so on. You can buy and sell someone's shares as an investment, for charity, even as a hostile act. Reaching "self-majority" - owning the majority of your own shares - is similar to becoming independently wealthy in today's world. The entire future society is based on this basic economic concept. I thought it was a fantastic idea and was really excited about the novel.
Unfortunately the brothers Kollin ruined this inventive idea with some really poor writing and plotting. It's a classic example of great concept, poor execution.
At the start of the novel, the cryogenically frozen body of Justin Cord, a 21st century billionaire is found and revived. Justin becomes something completely unique: an unincorporated man. The early part of the novel describes Justin's exploration of the brand new world he finds himself in: new societal values, new economy, new morals, new technology. This is probably the best part of the novel. However, after this relatively entertaining start, the novel takes a turn for the worse.
Part of the problem lies with the authors' writing skills. Dialogues veer from paragraph-long lectures to feeble and sometimes crude attempts at humor. Most characters are cardboard-thin. The plot has a childlike simplicity complete with forbidden love interest and evil mastermind.
In addition, parts of the book read like a libertarian manifesto. Whether you subscribe to that ideology or not, its representation here is extreme and, frankly, crude - e.g. the word "taxes" is practically a curse, and you'll find things like "can you believe governments were allowed to manage currencies in the past?".
I found it truly depressing that such a great concept could be so badly handled. To make matters even worse, the novel completely falls apart in the last 100 pages or so, throwing a huge new concept in the mix completely out of the blue and then leading to a resolution that wouldn't be out of place in a B movie or a comic book. I don't want to go into detail to avoid spoilers - all I can say is that I was literally shaking my head in astonishment.
Before reading the end of the novel, I was ready to give this book two stars, simply because the concept of personal incorporation is so fresh and new. However, the conclusion is so botched that I have to rate this one star.
Unfortunately the brothers Kollin ruined this inventive idea with some really poor writing and plotting. It's a classic example of great concept, poor execution.
At the start of the novel, the cryogenically frozen body of Justin Cord, a 21st century billionaire is found and revived. Justin becomes something completely unique: an unincorporated man. The early part of the novel describes Justin's exploration of the brand new world he finds himself in: new societal values, new economy, new morals, new technology. This is probably the best part of the novel. However, after this relatively entertaining start, the novel takes a turn for the worse.
Part of the problem lies with the authors' writing skills. Dialogues veer from paragraph-long lectures to feeble and sometimes crude attempts at humor. Most characters are cardboard-thin. The plot has a childlike simplicity complete with forbidden love interest and evil mastermind.
In addition, parts of the book read like a libertarian manifesto. Whether you subscribe to that ideology or not, its representation here is extreme and, frankly, crude - e.g. the word "taxes" is practically a curse, and you'll find things like "can you believe governments were allowed to manage currencies in the past?".
I found it truly depressing that such a great concept could be so badly handled. To make matters even worse, the novel completely falls apart in the last 100 pages or so, throwing a huge new concept in the mix completely out of the blue and then leading to a resolution that wouldn't be out of place in a B movie or a comic book. I don't want to go into detail to avoid spoilers - all I can say is that I was literally shaking my head in astonishment.
Before reading the end of the novel, I was ready to give this book two stars, simply because the concept of personal incorporation is so fresh and new. However, the conclusion is so botched that I have to rate this one star.
July 5, 2012
Storyline: 2 stars
Character likeability: 1 star
World building:4 stars
American propaganda: -1star
Three hundred years in the past a rich man has himself cryogenicly frozen and sealed away somewhere safe. He is reanimated into a future world where every individual is incorporated. Parents own a 20% stock in there kids. Shareholders vote on major decisions for an individual.
I really like the premise. It is incredibly interesting, especially when we learn about "penny stocks" and the chairman who wants to own all of his stock again. As I read I kept wondering why this book wasn't better known, but I knew the answer by the end.
The author is very heavy-handed in his love for his country, I began rolling my eyes. I could see the "I love America" shirt that I am sure the author was wearing as he typed.
The twin towers rhetoric is gets a bit old. 300 years into the future it is the most talked about historical event.... A very american book, not to downgrade the sadness of the attack, it wasn't as significant to the rest of the world."
The main character is arrogant. So arrogant that he ignites a civil war by refusing to become part of the new world, instead he doggedly tries to change it all back to the way it was in his lifetime, 300 years earlier. I am still not sure whether we are supposed to think this or wether we are supposed to agree with him. Is this American "middle of the world" arrogance again?". The author seems compelled to tell us just how wonderful 20th century America is.
Even at the end of the book I still didn't like the main character. He was alright, but he was so wrong but he didn't know it. I don't think the author even knew it. I half expect every American reader not to know it (hope I am wrong).
I kept reading simply because I really enjoyed the way this economy worked. The storyline was superfluous.
Character likeability: 1 star
World building:4 stars
American propaganda: -1star
Three hundred years in the past a rich man has himself cryogenicly frozen and sealed away somewhere safe. He is reanimated into a future world where every individual is incorporated. Parents own a 20% stock in there kids. Shareholders vote on major decisions for an individual.
I really like the premise. It is incredibly interesting, especially when we learn about "penny stocks" and the chairman who wants to own all of his stock again. As I read I kept wondering why this book wasn't better known, but I knew the answer by the end.
The author is very heavy-handed in his love for his country, I began rolling my eyes. I could see the "I love America" shirt that I am sure the author was wearing as he typed.
The twin towers rhetoric is gets a bit old. 300 years into the future it is the most talked about historical event.... A very american book, not to downgrade the sadness of the attack, it wasn't as significant to the rest of the world."
The main character is arrogant. So arrogant that he ignites a civil war by refusing to become part of the new world, instead he doggedly tries to change it all back to the way it was in his lifetime, 300 years earlier. I am still not sure whether we are supposed to think this or wether we are supposed to agree with him. Is this American "middle of the world" arrogance again?". The author seems compelled to tell us just how wonderful 20th century America is.
Even at the end of the book I still didn't like the main character. He was alright, but he was so wrong but he didn't know it. I don't think the author even knew it. I half expect every American reader not to know it (hope I am wrong).
I kept reading simply because I really enjoyed the way this economy worked. The storyline was superfluous.
December 15, 2014
Do you have a brick wall handy? Because hitting your head against that would be a more productive and more enjoyable experience than listening to The Unincorporated Man as an audiobook. This was the only format in which it was available through my library. Audiobooks are not my preferred format for reading. They can definitely be great if you have good material and a good narrator. The narrator here, Todd McLaren, wasn’t bad—but even he couldn’t make this book sound interesting. Even at 2.5x speed it took me a week to get through this, because I did not want to subject myself to yet another sermon. I only finished it because I knew I would enjoy writing this review—call it necessary catharsis—and, yeah, I kind of wanted to see how it ended.
The Kollins’ writing … let’s see, how can I best describe this? Imagine Ayn Rand and Robert Heinlein having a dinner party together. (They each brought their own meal because it’s in their enlightened self-interest not to take food from their own mouths to share with another. Little did they know that they would suffer from food poisoning because the unregulated food market cut corners.) Terry Goodkind would be proud of the length of some of the speeches in this book.
Surprisingly it isn’t the philosophy itself that makes The Unincorporated Man so unequiovcally awful. I’m not as libertarian as Justin Cord or, presumably, his authors—but I certainly balk at the idea of personal incorporation. I share Justin’s repugnance at the idea of owning stock in another human being, collecting dividends on their earnings, having a say in where they live. The Kollins chose a great time in which to write and publish this book, because I am one of many people concerned about the way in which corporations exercise their power in our society. Personal incorporation might sound silly right now, but this is a dystopia I could see happening in one of our possible futures. So in this respect, the Kollins have certainly created a credible bogeyman.
But their terrible writing ruins any chances the book has of being compelling science fiction.
I am reminded of For Us, the Living, a Heinlein novel I read in my halcyon youth long before Goodreads. I don’t remember much about it, except that younger!Ben was super-impressed by Heinlein’s economic philosophies that appeared to create a utopian future. I suspect that present!Ben would be less impressed were I to revisit it. Superficially, The Unincorporated Man is strikingly similar: a man wakes up after a few centuries of stasis and discovers a supposedly “better” world with radically different economic policies. He then spends most of the book being lectured by a female companion, who is happy to explain not only the differences but the intricate details of how the systems function and how they came about.
It has been a long time since I’ve seen such a textbook example of terrible exposition. Justin, understandably, has a question about how this brave new world works. His companions don’t deliver the simple, curt answer one might expect. Oh, no. They initiate multi-page Socratic dialogues. Scenes that should be short and sweet play out like first-year university lectures on political science or economic game theory. Every character in this book is incredibly well-versed in the economic underpinnings of their society and willing to spout on about those underpinnings at length to Justin without much prompting whatsoever. The end result is that one can’t get more than a page or so ahead without hearing a lecture about how market forces are superior to government intervention or blah … blah … blah.
Look, the point of a philosophical novel is to edify through the plot and characters, not use them as transparent mouthpieces. Only Sophie’s World can get away with that shit, and that’s because it’s Norwegian and awesome, OK?
The Kollins also make the classic Goodkind mistake of letting their hero make big speeches about how his libertarian views are inherently superior to everyone else’s. Also, this gives him the moral superiority that allows him to ignore explicit threats to his friends and loved ones and shrug off any possibility that they might be harmed because he does whatever the fuck he wants—’cause he’s a libertarian badass, yo. Justin Cord could give Richard Rahl a run for his money with some of these speeches about how it’s tyranny to force an individual to do anything “for the greater good”. So what if Neela or Omad get hurt in the process? At least he has his principles!
Seriously, by the end of the book I was actually hoping Justin would give in and incorporate. I hate the idea of incorporation, but I was starting to feel uncomfortable hanging out with this guy. He strikes me as the sort of person who would let the Joker blow up that boat of refugees just because he doesn’t want to let the Joker impose his will on Justin. (I know Justin explicitly condemns violent acts, but he seems fuzzy about this whole violence through inaction concept.)
Related to this pervasive problem of infodump is the Kollins’ inexcusable abuse of the omniscient narrator to compound the problem with yet another layer of exposition. As a fan of Victorian novels, I’m more used to the omniscient narrator than readers of more modern novels might be. Yet even I was shocked by the heavy-handed way in which the Kollins use their narrator to flesh out characters’ backgrounds, thoughts, and feelings. Much in the same way that a single question from Justin could trigger pages of explanation, a single, unasked question from the reader would somehow prompt the narrator to go on—at length—about history or politics or current events.
The one lesson about writing you must take away from The Unincorporated Man is that less is more. The hard part about writing is not transmitting information to the reader but deciding what information to leave out to make the story work. The Kollins clearly haven’t mastered this yet.
Speaking of narration, can we talk about how, upon introducing a new character, the narrator immediately comments about their appearance? I don’t mean the narrator describes how the character looks; the narrator gives a judgement about the character’s looks and sex appeal. The women are invariably objectified through the male gaze. I question the Kollins’ conviction that cheap and abundant nanotechnology means everyone is going to be young and beautiful—if anything, it seems to me like that’s a recipe for allowing people to “let themselves go,” secure in the knowledge that nanites can fix them up and make them beautiful again at any point. But that’s their choice, of course, and I digress. I just wish they could introduce a woman without talking about how she’s, you know, average-level good looking for that society, but people would totally sleep with her anyway. Thank you, so much, for that crucial information.
I was looking for a book that imagined a future in which corporate capitalism has been taken even further than it has in our world. The Unincorporated Man is such a book. It is also boring, terribly written, and not worth your time.
I leave you with a rare image, because the Robot Devil really does say it best:
The Kollins’ writing … let’s see, how can I best describe this? Imagine Ayn Rand and Robert Heinlein having a dinner party together. (They each brought their own meal because it’s in their enlightened self-interest not to take food from their own mouths to share with another. Little did they know that they would suffer from food poisoning because the unregulated food market cut corners.) Terry Goodkind would be proud of the length of some of the speeches in this book.
Surprisingly it isn’t the philosophy itself that makes The Unincorporated Man so unequiovcally awful. I’m not as libertarian as Justin Cord or, presumably, his authors—but I certainly balk at the idea of personal incorporation. I share Justin’s repugnance at the idea of owning stock in another human being, collecting dividends on their earnings, having a say in where they live. The Kollins chose a great time in which to write and publish this book, because I am one of many people concerned about the way in which corporations exercise their power in our society. Personal incorporation might sound silly right now, but this is a dystopia I could see happening in one of our possible futures. So in this respect, the Kollins have certainly created a credible bogeyman.
But their terrible writing ruins any chances the book has of being compelling science fiction.
I am reminded of For Us, the Living, a Heinlein novel I read in my halcyon youth long before Goodreads. I don’t remember much about it, except that younger!Ben was super-impressed by Heinlein’s economic philosophies that appeared to create a utopian future. I suspect that present!Ben would be less impressed were I to revisit it. Superficially, The Unincorporated Man is strikingly similar: a man wakes up after a few centuries of stasis and discovers a supposedly “better” world with radically different economic policies. He then spends most of the book being lectured by a female companion, who is happy to explain not only the differences but the intricate details of how the systems function and how they came about.
It has been a long time since I’ve seen such a textbook example of terrible exposition. Justin, understandably, has a question about how this brave new world works. His companions don’t deliver the simple, curt answer one might expect. Oh, no. They initiate multi-page Socratic dialogues. Scenes that should be short and sweet play out like first-year university lectures on political science or economic game theory. Every character in this book is incredibly well-versed in the economic underpinnings of their society and willing to spout on about those underpinnings at length to Justin without much prompting whatsoever. The end result is that one can’t get more than a page or so ahead without hearing a lecture about how market forces are superior to government intervention or blah … blah … blah.
Look, the point of a philosophical novel is to edify through the plot and characters, not use them as transparent mouthpieces. Only Sophie’s World can get away with that shit, and that’s because it’s Norwegian and awesome, OK?
The Kollins also make the classic Goodkind mistake of letting their hero make big speeches about how his libertarian views are inherently superior to everyone else’s. Also, this gives him the moral superiority that allows him to ignore explicit threats to his friends and loved ones and shrug off any possibility that they might be harmed because he does whatever the fuck he wants—’cause he’s a libertarian badass, yo. Justin Cord could give Richard Rahl a run for his money with some of these speeches about how it’s tyranny to force an individual to do anything “for the greater good”. So what if Neela or Omad get hurt in the process? At least he has his principles!
Seriously, by the end of the book I was actually hoping Justin would give in and incorporate. I hate the idea of incorporation, but I was starting to feel uncomfortable hanging out with this guy. He strikes me as the sort of person who would let the Joker blow up that boat of refugees just because he doesn’t want to let the Joker impose his will on Justin. (I know Justin explicitly condemns violent acts, but he seems fuzzy about this whole violence through inaction concept.)
Related to this pervasive problem of infodump is the Kollins’ inexcusable abuse of the omniscient narrator to compound the problem with yet another layer of exposition. As a fan of Victorian novels, I’m more used to the omniscient narrator than readers of more modern novels might be. Yet even I was shocked by the heavy-handed way in which the Kollins use their narrator to flesh out characters’ backgrounds, thoughts, and feelings. Much in the same way that a single question from Justin could trigger pages of explanation, a single, unasked question from the reader would somehow prompt the narrator to go on—at length—about history or politics or current events.
The one lesson about writing you must take away from The Unincorporated Man is that less is more. The hard part about writing is not transmitting information to the reader but deciding what information to leave out to make the story work. The Kollins clearly haven’t mastered this yet.
Speaking of narration, can we talk about how, upon introducing a new character, the narrator immediately comments about their appearance? I don’t mean the narrator describes how the character looks; the narrator gives a judgement about the character’s looks and sex appeal. The women are invariably objectified through the male gaze. I question the Kollins’ conviction that cheap and abundant nanotechnology means everyone is going to be young and beautiful—if anything, it seems to me like that’s a recipe for allowing people to “let themselves go,” secure in the knowledge that nanites can fix them up and make them beautiful again at any point. But that’s their choice, of course, and I digress. I just wish they could introduce a woman without talking about how she’s, you know, average-level good looking for that society, but people would totally sleep with her anyway. Thank you, so much, for that crucial information.
I was looking for a book that imagined a future in which corporate capitalism has been taken even further than it has in our world. The Unincorporated Man is such a book. It is also boring, terribly written, and not worth your time.
I leave you with a rare image, because the Robot Devil really does say it best:
March 27, 2017
This was a totally original idea made into an interesting story. I really like the concept of being able to incorporate a person. Work hard to try to buy your outstanding shares to thus own a majority and then be able to control your own life. You can never own all as the Government owns a mandatory 5%. You can buy shares in other people who you believe are a good investment. Your earning are then paid out as dividends, so the more of your own shares you own, the more of your income stays with you. It all makes sense to me, but since investing in shares is part of what I do for a living, I understood the concept fully.
The part that I thought was odd was probably the part that everyone was rooting for. The Unincorporated man refuses to incorporate. He wants his "freedom". Thus a revolution is on the horizon where others also want their "freedom". In my thinking, everyone, regardless of when they live, has to pay for certain things in life whether they want to or not. Roads, streetlights, police and fire, etc. They are currently paid via taxes but in this future, they are paid via dividends from shares the Gov't owns of every citizen. To be unincorporated means others have to pay for these benefits for you. Somehow, I have found myself solidly on the side of the antagonists. This has never happened before.
I'm looking forward to reading more in this series although I know I seem to be rooting for the losing side. It's not that I like the "bad" guys, but I believe in what they believe in more so than the side of the freedom revolutionists.
The part that I thought was odd was probably the part that everyone was rooting for. The Unincorporated man refuses to incorporate. He wants his "freedom". Thus a revolution is on the horizon where others also want their "freedom". In my thinking, everyone, regardless of when they live, has to pay for certain things in life whether they want to or not. Roads, streetlights, police and fire, etc. They are currently paid via taxes but in this future, they are paid via dividends from shares the Gov't owns of every citizen. To be unincorporated means others have to pay for these benefits for you. Somehow, I have found myself solidly on the side of the antagonists. This has never happened before.
I'm looking forward to reading more in this series although I know I seem to be rooting for the losing side. It's not that I like the "bad" guys, but I believe in what they believe in more so than the side of the freedom revolutionists.
June 3, 2010
So, I think I liked this book a lot better while I was reading it than once I was done -- it might just be because the first half was like 42 times better than the second half. And once it was done I was left feeling very unsatisfied, and I think there are a couple of reasons for this.
The premise of the book is that in the future, people are like individual corporations which can buy and sell percentages of their earnings -- the government gets an automatic 5%, parents get 20%, and the rest you can sell to pay for schooling, training, stuff, etc. Throughout the book various characters give various reasons for why this is a grand way to go. And then there's the one dude, who basically time travels without being part of the incorporated system and starts whining about slavery and freedom and *minor spoiler alert* starts a revolution.
So, problem the first: I actually think that self-incorporation isn't that terrible an idea -- a significant problem with this future society is that it's involuntary, but I think that voluntary incorporation in exchange for currently unreachable benefits is not the worst idea anyone ever had. Especially given that people can eventually buy back their stock. This probably makes me a terrible person, since despite the fact that many people make many logical arguments for the system, it's obvious that you, as the reader, are supposed to have an automatic pro-"freedom" gut reaction that makes you disregard any of those arguments as automatically slavery. But seriously, especially given that at least initially 75% of your stock is yours to sell, incorporation actually isn't that much like slavery after all -- maybe more like indentured servitude, but I don't think indentured servitude was the worst idea anyone had either. Bleh. Also, I think you are supposed to have an automatically negative gut reaction to big, bad corporations. And I don't. I don't think that profit seeking behavior in corporations is inherently evil. I don't think corporate boards who direct such profit seeking behavior are evil. But, apparently you're supposed to.
Problem the second: The book has a really annoying habit of building detailed back stories for characters who matter for about six seconds in the book. Like this reporter who's sole function is to report the arrival of the Unincorporated Man and then later get another special interview for him gets seriously like 20 pages of back story -- which, granted, also SORT OF reveals something about another absent character, but not really. Related to this, the book starts to wander off into subplots that end up having nothing to do with anything. For example *spoiler alert* it turns out that the AI entities in the book ARE REAL INTELLIGENCES!!! AND THEY HAVE A MEETING! IN WHICH THEY DECIDE THAT THEY AREN'T GOING TO AFFECT THE PLOT OF THE BOOK!!! I'm not even kidding. Why are you even in this book HAL-like intelligences? (It turns out that there's going to be a sequel, so maybe they will matter then?)
Problem the third: This was obviously a first novel. There were also sentences that would occasionally jar, a backstory to the creation of the incorporated system that didn't seem to connect well, and some other minor stuff. But I enjoyed reading it -- the premise is thought-provoking enough, and it engaged me enough to get me through many, many hours of air travel with its accompanying annoyance.
The premise of the book is that in the future, people are like individual corporations which can buy and sell percentages of their earnings -- the government gets an automatic 5%, parents get 20%, and the rest you can sell to pay for schooling, training, stuff, etc. Throughout the book various characters give various reasons for why this is a grand way to go. And then there's the one dude, who basically time travels without being part of the incorporated system and starts whining about slavery and freedom and *minor spoiler alert* starts a revolution.
So, problem the first: I actually think that self-incorporation isn't that terrible an idea -- a significant problem with this future society is that it's involuntary, but I think that voluntary incorporation in exchange for currently unreachable benefits is not the worst idea anyone ever had. Especially given that people can eventually buy back their stock. This probably makes me a terrible person, since despite the fact that many people make many logical arguments for the system, it's obvious that you, as the reader, are supposed to have an automatic pro-"freedom" gut reaction that makes you disregard any of those arguments as automatically slavery. But seriously, especially given that at least initially 75% of your stock is yours to sell, incorporation actually isn't that much like slavery after all -- maybe more like indentured servitude, but I don't think indentured servitude was the worst idea anyone had either. Bleh. Also, I think you are supposed to have an automatically negative gut reaction to big, bad corporations. And I don't. I don't think that profit seeking behavior in corporations is inherently evil. I don't think corporate boards who direct such profit seeking behavior are evil. But, apparently you're supposed to.
Problem the second: The book has a really annoying habit of building detailed back stories for characters who matter for about six seconds in the book. Like this reporter who's sole function is to report the arrival of the Unincorporated Man and then later get another special interview for him gets seriously like 20 pages of back story -- which, granted, also SORT OF reveals something about another absent character, but not really. Related to this, the book starts to wander off into subplots that end up having nothing to do with anything. For example *spoiler alert* it turns out that the AI entities in the book ARE REAL INTELLIGENCES!!! AND THEY HAVE A MEETING! IN WHICH THEY DECIDE THAT THEY AREN'T GOING TO AFFECT THE PLOT OF THE BOOK!!! I'm not even kidding. Why are you even in this book HAL-like intelligences? (It turns out that there's going to be a sequel, so maybe they will matter then?)
Problem the third: This was obviously a first novel. There were also sentences that would occasionally jar, a backstory to the creation of the incorporated system that didn't seem to connect well, and some other minor stuff. But I enjoyed reading it -- the premise is thought-provoking enough, and it engaged me enough to get me through many, many hours of air travel with its accompanying annoyance.
September 2, 2009
4.0 to 4.5 stars. Excellent debut novel. It is always nice when a truly unique idea comes along and the central idea of this book is certainly that. A great piece of libertarian science fiction from a fresh new voice (or voices). I look forward to this duos next book. Recommended.
May 4, 2009
First, thank you to Ayn Rand for not writing her 'economic libertarian' novels in a series, (e.g. imagine reading the last page of Atlas Shrugged Library Edition Part 2..."stay tuned for Ann's continuation of the Atlas saga, _Atlas Itched_!") The only serious disappointment was the author's inability to complete this in a single volume. Having said that, the Kollin brothers are a very clear major new voice in science fiction, very welcome. This novel could be a nominee for the nebulas or hugos next year, it's that good. Great characterization, nice world-building around libertarian economics. Very well done.
November 26, 2017
Oh boy. Okay. This is the longest it's taken me to read a book in quite a long time, and I waffled on the rating for one very specific reason: it's legitimately hard for me to tell if I'm just really not the intended audience for this book, or if the book is, in fact, bad. I'm leaning towards that second option, but not everyone's going to agree with that assessment.
Here's the reason: I read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy that has messages that I'm not on board with. For example, I loved "Ender's Game," and it definitely promotes imperialism and colonization. A lot of SFF does. But books and characters with moral and sociopolitical centers that I don't share aren't inherently bad. Oftentimes, the contrast with my own character helps me assess my own boundaries. There can be positive takeaways in stories that don't resonate with the reader.
So with all of that said, it was a serious chore to get through "The Unincorporated Man." Not only does it read like propaganda all the way through (think "Looking Backwards" by Bellamy, if you're familiar with that one), but it's also exceedingly self-congratulatory. Every western sci-fi staple is here: nanotech (construction, body modification, assemblers that can create custom interior spaces), space travel, terraforming, Mars colonization, walls that open and close instead of actual doors, VR, AIs, robot waiters, magnetic elevators, reverse-aging, flying cars, megacorps... all of it's slammed into a future vision that manages to be both too busy and too generic. This is meant to take place 300 years after "present day," and also after a society-ending event that pulled the fabric of human civilization apart. That is TOO MANY THINGS to develop in 300 years even without a global collapse. Too. Many. Things.
The authors seem very proud of themselves for all of the things they made up. And that's okay, but the off-putting thing to me is how evident it feels. Instead of letting the reader rest inside Justin's perspective and learn the world (and this is the perfect type of story and the perfect type of protagonist to do this with), they go with third-person omniscient. This allows them to explain all the cool stuff in their world, including all the things that Justin doesn't understand or doesn't notice. Justin is a reader vehicle for some of it, but the authors just can't resist throwing the rest of it in, too. I admit that I've never enjoyed perspective-jumping within a single scene (I'd rather follow a single perspective at a time instead of knowing what all the characters in a conversation are thinking), but using it in this way made it a bit worse.
I've written a lot so far. Are you ready to read more? Because I've got more. The way that the authors have written their story and their characters makes me think that they haven't had many conversations with actual human women. This sounds unkind, since at least one of the authors is married and has children, but it really... doesn't seem that way. It's like they made a sincere effort to write female characters who are in positions of power (doctors, lawyers, corporate accountants, etc.), but didn't have a great understanding of how to portray them convincingly. High-powered women in this book are prone to emotional outbursts, but I suppose it's good that the word "hysterical" isn't used as many times as it clearly could have been. A point is always made about physical beauty even when it's not particularly relevant, and there are a couple of scenes that really stand out as Two Straight Guys Wrote This and This is Their Fantasy (I will refer to them as Lawsuit Breast Fondle and Sexy Mardi Gras Devil--if you've read, you know what I'm talking about). Most of the male characters address at least one female character as "my dear" in conversation (repeatedly), most of the female characters take being ogled as a compliment, and I was definitely done with the use of the term "his lover" after... let's be honest, the first time it appeared on the page. The men in the book tend towards "man's man" behaviors: marching purposefully into rooms, smoking cigars, corporate scheming, standing in tall buildings, and waxing poetic about Very Old Scotch That Rich Guys Like.
So, gender representation here is very reminiscent of Heinlein's novels overall. There are allusions to non-hetero and poly folks in more-or-less neutral terms (implying that they're socially accepted), but that's just background detail. Every on-page character is either a hetero-coded Red Blooded Male or a hetero-coded femme woman. I'd like to state here that I've read plenty of books that only have straight characters in them (most of them gender-normative), but I minded less in most of those cases because it wasn't so obvious. If you're tossing in references to LGBTQ+ folks as background scenery, it kinda puts a spotlight on the fact that none of them are in the foreground. They're window-dressing, not people.
If you're still with me by this point, you're probably at a similar place where I ended up: you are not the target audience for this book. I'm certainly not. It's cool if you want to write sci-fi that's 100% straight male power fantasy, but wow... it's hard for me to read that without a lot of eye-rolling. This book reads like it belongs in the 60s, and will probably turn away all but the most enthusiastically libertarian rugged individualists. (Or, you know, readers who power through just to see what happens.) The only people I can recommend this to in good conscience are, in fact, Libertarians, fans of Ayn Rand, and folks who think that Heinlein really nailed positive female representation in his novels. If you are in one of these groups, go wild. You will love this book. It is very much your jam.
If none of those things describes you, I'd recommend giving this one a miss. The concept is kind of neat, but everything built around it is painful. And keep in mind... I didn't even really drill down here on all the reasons why Justin Cord is a ridiculous character. Based on all the context here, though, you can probably make a pretty educated guess.
August 20, 2011
Fascinating. While the protagonist was largely frustrating, I love that this book brought some fresh ideas to a genre largely in need of them. The concept that in the future people own shares in you & your future earnings was highly original. I love that a guy from our time who cryogenically froze himself wakes up in a future as the only person who isn't incorporated ie no one owns stock in him. The book did a great job of showing both sides of the coin for why society & individuals should & shouldn't have a stake in a persons future & future earning potential. While I wanted to yell at the protagonist many times, it was a compelling read and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a thought provoking sci-fi read
June 28, 2010
The Unincorporated Man is an idea story and at its heart it's a good idea forming the basis. The problem is that the novel is plagued with every writing, plotting, and character mistake for which idea novels are known.
The gist of it is that a man from our time is awakened after a three-century cryogenic sleep and thrust into a society of complete corporatocracy – where governments have no power and all the rules are made by corporations, which are so pervasive that every person, from birth, is incorporated and dreams of the nearly unattainable: owning a majority shares of themselves.
The Problems:
#1 – The novel is an elaborate strawman. It sets up an argument between Libertarianism and Corporatocracy without considering merit in any other line of thought in the political spectrum. It's as if you had a present-day debate between the far far right and the way-out wacko right for the direction of the nation. That this strawman exists, in and of itself isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the authors refused to entertain that any other viable systems could exist or could have survived a complete societal collapse that they wrote was predicated on a uneconomic basis. (That is, of course, unless one argues that everything is economics at its core.)
#2 – The Protagonist, Justin Cord, is perfect. This is one of my biggest pet peeves and it lives in hack genre books. Of course he was a billionaire, a genius, and a very handsome man. Every setback for Justin Cord is only an opportunity to acquire more wealth in a way that turns out better than his original plan, every person entering his life makes him stronger, better, more complete, and every goal is obtained by the model of all that is right and holy about rich, white, American ingenuity. Dear God I wanted to vomit. The Self-Made Man!! Every cliché ever uttered by unimaginative ideologues permeated the pages of this book. This is Ayn Rand's John Gault or Henry Reardon thrown into the Utopia of his adolescent wet dreams, and if that isn't bad enough, it's a schlocky second-rate story next to the mother of objectivism.
#3 – There is no characterization. Not really. These are cardboard stereotypes at their worst. The good guy is never bad. The bad guy is never good. Their actions are straight out of Tea-Party fairy tales. The women are beautiful, the men have square jaws and broad shoulders and the children are above average. I just wanted one single character who broke the mold, who wasn't either the genius, the babe, the self-interested obstacle, or the pleasant but competent comic relief. Shuffle up the stock characters and deal them out again!
There are plenty of other problems, but you get the idea. I didn't like the book even though it held my interest, and that's something I'll admit. It was like watching a bullfight and hoping for the never-to-come goring.
Save your money, and your time.
The gist of it is that a man from our time is awakened after a three-century cryogenic sleep and thrust into a society of complete corporatocracy – where governments have no power and all the rules are made by corporations, which are so pervasive that every person, from birth, is incorporated and dreams of the nearly unattainable: owning a majority shares of themselves.
The Problems:
#1 – The novel is an elaborate strawman. It sets up an argument between Libertarianism and Corporatocracy without considering merit in any other line of thought in the political spectrum. It's as if you had a present-day debate between the far far right and the way-out wacko right for the direction of the nation. That this strawman exists, in and of itself isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the authors refused to entertain that any other viable systems could exist or could have survived a complete societal collapse that they wrote was predicated on a uneconomic basis. (That is, of course, unless one argues that everything is economics at its core.)
#2 – The Protagonist, Justin Cord, is perfect. This is one of my biggest pet peeves and it lives in hack genre books. Of course he was a billionaire, a genius, and a very handsome man. Every setback for Justin Cord is only an opportunity to acquire more wealth in a way that turns out better than his original plan, every person entering his life makes him stronger, better, more complete, and every goal is obtained by the model of all that is right and holy about rich, white, American ingenuity. Dear God I wanted to vomit. The Self-Made Man!! Every cliché ever uttered by unimaginative ideologues permeated the pages of this book. This is Ayn Rand's John Gault or Henry Reardon thrown into the Utopia of his adolescent wet dreams, and if that isn't bad enough, it's a schlocky second-rate story next to the mother of objectivism.
#3 – There is no characterization. Not really. These are cardboard stereotypes at their worst. The good guy is never bad. The bad guy is never good. Their actions are straight out of Tea-Party fairy tales. The women are beautiful, the men have square jaws and broad shoulders and the children are above average. I just wanted one single character who broke the mold, who wasn't either the genius, the babe, the self-interested obstacle, or the pleasant but competent comic relief. Shuffle up the stock characters and deal them out again!
There are plenty of other problems, but you get the idea. I didn't like the book even though it held my interest, and that's something I'll admit. It was like watching a bullfight and hoping for the never-to-come goring.
Save your money, and your time.
November 15, 2009
A friend of mine entreated me to read a book, but I just can't slog through it. The book is The Unincorporated Man by Dani and Eytan Kollin. I made it about 1/3 of the way through.
The basic premise is that in the future, people will all be their own corporations, and their shares will be available to be bought and sold by others on the open market. Interesting!
Then, a particularly old person (Justin) comes out of cold-sleep such that he is the only person in the world who is not actually incorporated. Okay, I think I might have read this before (brave new world, when the sleeper wakes, etc), but it's still a good plot device to get things started, and this can provide a good point-of-view character with which to explore Prospero's island.
There are two major deficiencies with the work as a novel. First, the authors' craft of writing needs work; this is a first novel, and it shows a LOT. The exchanges are heavy on dialogue, and the narration is multiple-first-person-omniscient - it reads more like a TV series bible than like a novel to me. I think the work might have been better envisioned as a series of short stories focusing on Justin. There are a lot of "gee-whiz"isms in place which are powered by handwavium. The problem with this is that instead of merely being part of the warp and weft of the fabric of daily life, they are called out and then hand-waved away, often with a knowing smirk toward the barbarians of the early 21st century. A couple of those snarks were amusing (you're mentally deficient? at least you didn't go to Harvard...), but they get old. Also, there are some surprising errors given the premise above (i.e. a person whose stock has fallen leveraging everything he has to buy up his own shares would not be engaging in "selling short" - that's describing a long position, not a short one). In any case, the writing shows promise but could definitely use more polish.
Second, Justin himself is someone who is drawn from the Gilbert Gosseyn / Lazarus Long / James Bolivar DiGriz school of over-competent heroes, but unfortunately the more I saw of him the less I liked him. I think this may come from the challenge of writing the Übermensch as a protagonist - he's too good at seeing through the society in which he finds himself.
Anyway, I look forward to checking out their next book.
The basic premise is that in the future, people will all be their own corporations, and their shares will be available to be bought and sold by others on the open market. Interesting!
Then, a particularly old person (Justin) comes out of cold-sleep such that he is the only person in the world who is not actually incorporated. Okay, I think I might have read this before (brave new world, when the sleeper wakes, etc), but it's still a good plot device to get things started, and this can provide a good point-of-view character with which to explore Prospero's island.
There are two major deficiencies with the work as a novel. First, the authors' craft of writing needs work; this is a first novel, and it shows a LOT. The exchanges are heavy on dialogue, and the narration is multiple-first-person-omniscient - it reads more like a TV series bible than like a novel to me. I think the work might have been better envisioned as a series of short stories focusing on Justin. There are a lot of "gee-whiz"isms in place which are powered by handwavium. The problem with this is that instead of merely being part of the warp and weft of the fabric of daily life, they are called out and then hand-waved away, often with a knowing smirk toward the barbarians of the early 21st century. A couple of those snarks were amusing (you're mentally deficient? at least you didn't go to Harvard...), but they get old. Also, there are some surprising errors given the premise above (i.e. a person whose stock has fallen leveraging everything he has to buy up his own shares would not be engaging in "selling short" - that's describing a long position, not a short one). In any case, the writing shows promise but could definitely use more polish.
Second, Justin himself is someone who is drawn from the Gilbert Gosseyn / Lazarus Long / James Bolivar DiGriz school of over-competent heroes, but unfortunately the more I saw of him the less I liked him. I think this may come from the challenge of writing the Übermensch as a protagonist - he's too good at seeing through the society in which he finds himself.
Anyway, I look forward to checking out their next book.
August 30, 2010
This book kicked my ass. It reminded me of some of the more intelligent Heinlein that I've enjoyed (Stranger in a Strange Land, Fear No Evil). And it has the political and interpersonal subtlety of Dune. But mostly it succeeds on its own merits: it's intelligent, well written, full of great action and gripping characters--all in all I highly recommend this book to anyone who find themselves intrigued by the futuristic world viewed through the lens of human politics and economics exploded outward by several centuries.
May 30, 2011
The literary political-social dialectic and is alive and well, and being published by Tor: The Unincorporated Man looks like a political treatise disguised as a pretty good novel. Cleverly, it sets up a conflict with one unfortunate aspect of its ideal Objectivist/Libertarian future society, and in demolishing that one aspect it leaves the rest of the socio-political structure intact and unchallenged. As I said, clever.
For those not familiar with the modern Objectivist/Libertarian strain of thought – and I have to admit I’m only an interested observer, not an expert – I’ll try to sum up. The ideology that I’m referring to holds that ensuring individual liberty is the best and highest goal of society, and the only legitimate goal of government. Hence, the only appropriate functions of government are law enforcement and military protection. Once all individuals are able to act with complete freedom in their own self-interest, so long as they don’t interfere with others’ freedom, then humanity will finally enter into a period of universal peace and prosperity.
This is, in my humble opinion, about as realistic as the notion that the abolition of private property will lead to universal peace and prosperity. So as I read this novel, I frequently rolled my eyes, sighed, laughed aloud, and occasionally restrained the impulse to throw it across the room.
I didn’t hurl it because (a) the copy I was reading is a public library hardcover, and (b) it doesn’t really spend as much time on the ideological matters as I’m implying here. It’s “just” part of the underlying structure, and it may only have leaped out at me because I’ve been paying attention to the way this particular meme set has been creeping into modern politics.
The actual plot revolves around Justin Cord, who arranged to have himself secretly cryogenically suspended at some point in the twenty-first century, and was only found and reanimated after some 300 years. Upon awakening, he learns that reanimation is now routine, as are advanced nanotechnology and limited forms of artificial intelligence, space travel out to the asteroid belt and beyond, and a bunch of other things (including flying cars; I enjoyed his enjoyment of those), some of which seem to be pretty creative.
While he was disanimate, the world suffered a catastrophic economic, political, and demographic collapse. The current society has climbed out of that abyss and dispensed with taxes; the world government provides court and law enforcement services in competition with private operations and does no regulating whatsoever, and currencies are produced by forty-seven different corporations. And it’s a wonderfully prosperous, peaceful society, because corporations can be counted on to behave rationally, unlike governments.
I’ll pause here for you to think about Enron … Worldcom … Goldman-Sachs … certain US automakers … and whatever other examples you’re aware of.
The catch is something that Justin Cord, twenty-first century industrialist extraordinaire, can’t accept. All human beings are formally incorporated at birth; the government gets 5% of the child’s shares, its parents 20%, and its education is generally paid for by sales of shares (unless it’s from a rich family). Most people do not, in fact, own a majority of themselves, and therefore their choices (especially about employment) are limited by their shareholders’ input.
The theory, explained at a couple of different points at the book, is that when people or corporations own shares in a person, they will be interested in making sure that the person does well in life, thus increasing the dividends paid on the shares.
In the book, this works beautifully. In the real world, as we all know, a lady named Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote a book called Uncle Tom’s Cabin that illustrated exactly how beautifully ownership of people actually worked; and I expect you could ask modern-day escapees from slavery how they feel about it, too.
So, the plot of the novel is about Justin, the only unincorporated human being in the solar system, his refusal to incorporate (because it feels like slavery to him) and the effect this position has on the society around him. Because to begin with there is, in fact, a substantial level of discontent with this system; quite a few people own no more than 25% of themselves, for one reason or another, and have no prospect of ever being able to achieve majority control. Justin winds up in the bizarre position of trying to convince the government to let him volunteer to be taxed (instead of the government getting dividends from 5% of him).
So, on the surface the dialectic appears to be about slavery vs. freedom. Beneath the surface, the dialectic is our real modern world vs. the book’s ideal society, only reality doesn’t get to state its case, because the argument is all about the surface issue.
There are vicious lawsuits, good friends, a love story, political movements, terrorism, attempted and successful assassinations, nanotech bombs, and corporate politics all carrying the tale along. The actual plot holds together pretty well, though I have quibbles about the love affair getting a free pass in the end, and about the transformation of the chief antagonist from arrogant idiot to arrogant genius. And there are a couple of side issues that I’m not even mentioning, which I suspect may be important in the sequels (or may just be part of the world-building).
It’s the apparently sincere and earnest espousal of the basic ideological system that made it hard to keep reading. And just to demonstrate that I’m not imagining this, a little research informs me that the novel won a 2010 Prometheus Award – given by the “Libertarian Futurist Society.” Looking at their list of other winners, I don’t think that every winner is as good a fit as this one (Terry Pratchett’s Night Watch? Really?), but I think it helps prove my point all the same.
If you happen to agree with its ideology, I expect you’ll enjoy the book a lot. If you don’t, this review is fair warning. If you have no idea, I suggest you read up on the arguments for and against it before you try reading the book. (Most of my information on this ideology comes from reading Fred Clark’s Slacktivist blog; but you’ll have to search for the terms Ayn Rand and Libertarian in particular, because he also covers a lot of other material.)
For those not familiar with the modern Objectivist/Libertarian strain of thought – and I have to admit I’m only an interested observer, not an expert – I’ll try to sum up. The ideology that I’m referring to holds that ensuring individual liberty is the best and highest goal of society, and the only legitimate goal of government. Hence, the only appropriate functions of government are law enforcement and military protection. Once all individuals are able to act with complete freedom in their own self-interest, so long as they don’t interfere with others’ freedom, then humanity will finally enter into a period of universal peace and prosperity.
This is, in my humble opinion, about as realistic as the notion that the abolition of private property will lead to universal peace and prosperity. So as I read this novel, I frequently rolled my eyes, sighed, laughed aloud, and occasionally restrained the impulse to throw it across the room.
I didn’t hurl it because (a) the copy I was reading is a public library hardcover, and (b) it doesn’t really spend as much time on the ideological matters as I’m implying here. It’s “just” part of the underlying structure, and it may only have leaped out at me because I’ve been paying attention to the way this particular meme set has been creeping into modern politics.
The actual plot revolves around Justin Cord, who arranged to have himself secretly cryogenically suspended at some point in the twenty-first century, and was only found and reanimated after some 300 years. Upon awakening, he learns that reanimation is now routine, as are advanced nanotechnology and limited forms of artificial intelligence, space travel out to the asteroid belt and beyond, and a bunch of other things (including flying cars; I enjoyed his enjoyment of those), some of which seem to be pretty creative.
While he was disanimate, the world suffered a catastrophic economic, political, and demographic collapse. The current society has climbed out of that abyss and dispensed with taxes; the world government provides court and law enforcement services in competition with private operations and does no regulating whatsoever, and currencies are produced by forty-seven different corporations. And it’s a wonderfully prosperous, peaceful society, because corporations can be counted on to behave rationally, unlike governments.
I’ll pause here for you to think about Enron … Worldcom … Goldman-Sachs … certain US automakers … and whatever other examples you’re aware of.
The catch is something that Justin Cord, twenty-first century industrialist extraordinaire, can’t accept. All human beings are formally incorporated at birth; the government gets 5% of the child’s shares, its parents 20%, and its education is generally paid for by sales of shares (unless it’s from a rich family). Most people do not, in fact, own a majority of themselves, and therefore their choices (especially about employment) are limited by their shareholders’ input.
The theory, explained at a couple of different points at the book, is that when people or corporations own shares in a person, they will be interested in making sure that the person does well in life, thus increasing the dividends paid on the shares.
In the book, this works beautifully. In the real world, as we all know, a lady named Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote a book called Uncle Tom’s Cabin that illustrated exactly how beautifully ownership of people actually worked; and I expect you could ask modern-day escapees from slavery how they feel about it, too.
So, the plot of the novel is about Justin, the only unincorporated human being in the solar system, his refusal to incorporate (because it feels like slavery to him) and the effect this position has on the society around him. Because to begin with there is, in fact, a substantial level of discontent with this system; quite a few people own no more than 25% of themselves, for one reason or another, and have no prospect of ever being able to achieve majority control. Justin winds up in the bizarre position of trying to convince the government to let him volunteer to be taxed (instead of the government getting dividends from 5% of him).
So, on the surface the dialectic appears to be about slavery vs. freedom. Beneath the surface, the dialectic is our real modern world vs. the book’s ideal society, only reality doesn’t get to state its case, because the argument is all about the surface issue.
There are vicious lawsuits, good friends, a love story, political movements, terrorism, attempted and successful assassinations, nanotech bombs, and corporate politics all carrying the tale along. The actual plot holds together pretty well, though I have quibbles about the love affair getting a free pass in the end, and about the transformation of the chief antagonist from arrogant idiot to arrogant genius. And there are a couple of side issues that I’m not even mentioning, which I suspect may be important in the sequels (or may just be part of the world-building).
It’s the apparently sincere and earnest espousal of the basic ideological system that made it hard to keep reading. And just to demonstrate that I’m not imagining this, a little research informs me that the novel won a 2010 Prometheus Award – given by the “Libertarian Futurist Society.” Looking at their list of other winners, I don’t think that every winner is as good a fit as this one (Terry Pratchett’s Night Watch? Really?), but I think it helps prove my point all the same.
If you happen to agree with its ideology, I expect you’ll enjoy the book a lot. If you don’t, this review is fair warning. If you have no idea, I suggest you read up on the arguments for and against it before you try reading the book. (Most of my information on this ideology comes from reading Fred Clark’s Slacktivist blog; but you’ll have to search for the terms Ayn Rand and Libertarian in particular, because he also covers a lot of other material.)
March 14, 2012
I....can't....take....anymore. 143 pages in and so far this book has just been one huge political/economic thesis (yawn) combined with a 1950's "World of TOMORROW!" film, complete with be-spectacled narrator.
It's disappointing because the premise - billionaire has himself cryogenically suspended, then is re-awakened 300 years later (in the 24th century) to find that more than a little has changed - was promising. It could have been interesting, but alas, the authors have spent more time (way, way, way too much time) on the neat-o gadgets of the World! Of! Tomorrow! Flying cars! No hard currency! No doors! (because we have dissolving walls that can tell when an object is approaching). Personal avatar/assistants! The Internet is now the Neuro! Oh, god, please make it stop.
And then, of course, Justin has to have absolutely everything explained to him, from the tiniest bit of technology to big economics lessons. Blah, blah, blah, is there going to be any actual action in this? Or anything? "Golly gee, where does the light come from? You have sourceless lighting? Whaddaya mean, diamonds are worthless now?"
Meh. Heinlein did it better. Much better.
It's disappointing because the premise - billionaire has himself cryogenically suspended, then is re-awakened 300 years later (in the 24th century) to find that more than a little has changed - was promising. It could have been interesting, but alas, the authors have spent more time (way, way, way too much time) on the neat-o gadgets of the World! Of! Tomorrow! Flying cars! No hard currency! No doors! (because we have dissolving walls that can tell when an object is approaching). Personal avatar/assistants! The Internet is now the Neuro! Oh, god, please make it stop.
And then, of course, Justin has to have absolutely everything explained to him, from the tiniest bit of technology to big economics lessons. Blah, blah, blah, is there going to be any actual action in this? Or anything? "Golly gee, where does the light come from? You have sourceless lighting? Whaddaya mean, diamonds are worthless now?"
Meh. Heinlein did it better. Much better.
June 1, 2014
The premise of the book is interesting and original: a man with a terminal illness has himself frozen and is revived 3 or 4 centuries later. Society has evolved into one of personal incorporation: at birth, people are assigned 100,00 shares, 5% of which goes to the government, 20% to their family, and they are free to keep or sell the other 75% to finance college, start a business, or whatever. The first part of the book was interesting as we learn how Justin's frozen body was discovered and reanimated and how he adjusts to the changes that have taken place since he was frozen. The ideas the book introduces are interesting to ponder, but the book gets weighed down with too much lecturing on the pros and cons of different political and economic systems--to the point that, for me, it turned into a real slog. I had to force myself to finish the book and only managed that by skimming the last 100 pages. With some serious editing, I think this could be a great book and could probably make a great movie.
December 1, 2010
I wanted to like this a lot more than I did. Its premise (a future where individuals can incorporate, buying and selling shares in themselves) is a really intriguing thought experiment, and I went into the book prepared to explore a world where this was a foundational element of society.
Unfortunately, I found the story unpersuasive: the future society (seen through the eyes of a 21st-century individual who has himself cryogenically frozen, and is lucky enough to have his capsule discovered by a mining prospector) is thinly described, its economics never really explored beyond the basic premise. Okay, I get that economics just isn't as attention-getting as spaceships and nanotech and car chases, but if you're going to base your story on some sort of Big Idea, it behooves you to have the story explore that idea as thoroughly as possible. Few arguments are presented for or against this way of life, beyond embracing the status quo (why does Neela love this system so much?) or recoiling from it in disgust (Justin Cord--note initials, because he does indeed turn messianic in the second half, which I found SUPREMELY ironic--considers it slavery), and neither of those is particularly explored. The example of slavery that Justin cites is, of course, the one that will be most familiar to this book's target audience. It also seems to be the only one anybody in the novel is familiar with. Developing and setting out a definition of slavery and comparing the dominant socio-economic institution of the novel to it would have been one way of giving the story and its driving idea greater dimension. But opportunities like this languish largely unexplored, and as such I found the whole thing unconvincing.
The novel also loses considerably in its second half. The first half is interesting, with characters introduced, undergoing some development, and taking action with clearly understood motivation. All of that flies out the window in the second half, in favor of increasingly breathless, superficial screeds about freedom without any thoughtful exploration of what that word means, or what it might mean to people who've lived their entire lives under the incorporated system. For that reason, the rapidity of the rebellion's development in the second half defies belief, relying largely on the actions of an avowed sociopath and on the charisma of Justin himself. Hektor, the villain of the piece, is a far more intriguing character who appears to have given his own ideals and motivations serious thought, even if we're still largely left to our own devices to figure out what they are.
The biggest gap, however, is any understanding of WHY this society has developed the way it has. If any such history is offered in the novel, I missed it; the author instead devotes considerable time and effort to explaining virtual reality's absence in this future (including an effectively chilling VR sequence during which Justin learns exactly why this is so) that, as far as I can tell, has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the story. I suppose one could make the connection that society's VR addiction was irresponsible, and personal incorporation is supposed to guarantee responsible behavior. Okay, I guess. But that connection is not, to my recollect, explicitly made; nor is why humanity as a whole adopted THIS particular solution to the problem. No social institutions aside from corporations or governments appear to exist, which is just bizarre: a review on SF site noted the absence of any organized religion responding to or commenting on the worldwide social Grand Collapse; there isn't even a footnote to the effect that religions themselves were rendered irrelevant by an unsatisfactory response, which would be one possible scenario. There's little if anything about churches, communities, nonprofits, non-governmental organizations, or any of the other organizing bodies that exist in our world. If these don't exist in this future, what happened to them? And what replaced them?
The truth of the matter is, though, this book really didn't entertain me. Perhaps that's good, since entertainment is apparently considered dangerous in this future; it's hard to tell what people DO for entertainment, actually, aside from cutting loose during Mardi Gras. But though the story starts off reasonably well, the characters quickly lose any dimensionality they may have had in favor of serving as talking heads for various sides of the argument. Boring. Many characters are introduced, then abandoned partway through, including an ambitious, go-getting reporter who was also the only female character in the story who I found at all convincing or believable. Neela, who starts off well as a reanimationist working on the assignment of her life, is quickly relegated to love interest who readily sacrifices her career and social standing for Justin; if she struggles over this at all, those struggles take place off-screen. In fact, the gender dynamics in this story really bothered me; if anything, they've regressed in the 300 years that have passed before the story takes place. I'm pretty sure that at one point, someone is actually told not to worry her pretty little head about something. Seriously?
By the end of the book, I found myself growing impatient with the flat characterization, irritating gender dynamics, and increasingly polemical tone. When I got to the bit where somebody blames economic recessions on the government, adding the chestnut that their current society is recession-proof because the business cycle no longer exists, my suspension of disbelief snapped. I would love to hear the authors' explanation of how our current economic situation fits this scenario, particularly since one of them is (according to his bio) a "teacher of history, government and economics".
The thing is, though, I went into this novel prepared to be convinced: by good storytelling, interesting characters who behaved in a believable fashion, and a thorough exploration of the premise. What I got was a frustrating experience of being badgered by the authors whose characters functioned more as mouthpieces than as personalities, increasingly unbelievable plot developments, and irritation over rather than engagement with this future society as presented. I have no problem reading novels espousing ideas that I do not; if fiction has a useful purpose, it is to vicariously experience lives and ways of thinking that the reader never will, and thereby possibly develop some insight into them. The only insight I gained from this book is that my time would have been better spent with an economics textbook.
Also, I haven't been so annoyed by someone yelling "Freedom!" repetitively since Braveheart.
Unfortunately, I found the story unpersuasive: the future society (seen through the eyes of a 21st-century individual who has himself cryogenically frozen, and is lucky enough to have his capsule discovered by a mining prospector) is thinly described, its economics never really explored beyond the basic premise. Okay, I get that economics just isn't as attention-getting as spaceships and nanotech and car chases, but if you're going to base your story on some sort of Big Idea, it behooves you to have the story explore that idea as thoroughly as possible. Few arguments are presented for or against this way of life, beyond embracing the status quo (why does Neela love this system so much?) or recoiling from it in disgust (Justin Cord--note initials, because he does indeed turn messianic in the second half, which I found SUPREMELY ironic--considers it slavery), and neither of those is particularly explored. The example of slavery that Justin cites is, of course, the one that will be most familiar to this book's target audience. It also seems to be the only one anybody in the novel is familiar with. Developing and setting out a definition of slavery and comparing the dominant socio-economic institution of the novel to it would have been one way of giving the story and its driving idea greater dimension. But opportunities like this languish largely unexplored, and as such I found the whole thing unconvincing.
The novel also loses considerably in its second half. The first half is interesting, with characters introduced, undergoing some development, and taking action with clearly understood motivation. All of that flies out the window in the second half, in favor of increasingly breathless, superficial screeds about freedom without any thoughtful exploration of what that word means, or what it might mean to people who've lived their entire lives under the incorporated system. For that reason, the rapidity of the rebellion's development in the second half defies belief, relying largely on the actions of an avowed sociopath and on the charisma of Justin himself. Hektor, the villain of the piece, is a far more intriguing character who appears to have given his own ideals and motivations serious thought, even if we're still largely left to our own devices to figure out what they are.
The biggest gap, however, is any understanding of WHY this society has developed the way it has. If any such history is offered in the novel, I missed it; the author instead devotes considerable time and effort to explaining virtual reality's absence in this future (including an effectively chilling VR sequence during which Justin learns exactly why this is so) that, as far as I can tell, has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the story. I suppose one could make the connection that society's VR addiction was irresponsible, and personal incorporation is supposed to guarantee responsible behavior. Okay, I guess. But that connection is not, to my recollect, explicitly made; nor is why humanity as a whole adopted THIS particular solution to the problem. No social institutions aside from corporations or governments appear to exist, which is just bizarre: a review on SF site noted the absence of any organized religion responding to or commenting on the worldwide social Grand Collapse; there isn't even a footnote to the effect that religions themselves were rendered irrelevant by an unsatisfactory response, which would be one possible scenario. There's little if anything about churches, communities, nonprofits, non-governmental organizations, or any of the other organizing bodies that exist in our world. If these don't exist in this future, what happened to them? And what replaced them?
The truth of the matter is, though, this book really didn't entertain me. Perhaps that's good, since entertainment is apparently considered dangerous in this future; it's hard to tell what people DO for entertainment, actually, aside from cutting loose during Mardi Gras. But though the story starts off reasonably well, the characters quickly lose any dimensionality they may have had in favor of serving as talking heads for various sides of the argument. Boring. Many characters are introduced, then abandoned partway through, including an ambitious, go-getting reporter who was also the only female character in the story who I found at all convincing or believable. Neela, who starts off well as a reanimationist working on the assignment of her life, is quickly relegated to love interest who readily sacrifices her career and social standing for Justin; if she struggles over this at all, those struggles take place off-screen. In fact, the gender dynamics in this story really bothered me; if anything, they've regressed in the 300 years that have passed before the story takes place. I'm pretty sure that at one point, someone is actually told not to worry her pretty little head about something. Seriously?
By the end of the book, I found myself growing impatient with the flat characterization, irritating gender dynamics, and increasingly polemical tone. When I got to the bit where somebody blames economic recessions on the government, adding the chestnut that their current society is recession-proof because the business cycle no longer exists, my suspension of disbelief snapped. I would love to hear the authors' explanation of how our current economic situation fits this scenario, particularly since one of them is (according to his bio) a "teacher of history, government and economics".
The thing is, though, I went into this novel prepared to be convinced: by good storytelling, interesting characters who behaved in a believable fashion, and a thorough exploration of the premise. What I got was a frustrating experience of being badgered by the authors whose characters functioned more as mouthpieces than as personalities, increasingly unbelievable plot developments, and irritation over rather than engagement with this future society as presented. I have no problem reading novels espousing ideas that I do not; if fiction has a useful purpose, it is to vicariously experience lives and ways of thinking that the reader never will, and thereby possibly develop some insight into them. The only insight I gained from this book is that my time would have been better spent with an economics textbook.
Also, I haven't been so annoyed by someone yelling "Freedom!" repetitively since Braveheart.
January 11, 2010
The first half of this book had such great promise. The idea of a future where everyone is incorporated and you buy/sell shares of each other and the resulting society with all of its pros (even the poor can get decent housing) and cons (shareholders can petition for you to undergo a psychological audit if they think you've gone crazy). The protagonist, Justin, wakes up 300 years after being cryogenically frozen (during what could be our current present), into a world where incorporation is the norm but he is not. Justin just happens to be a reasonably intelligent and filthy rich businessman in his past and in the novel's present who uses his knowledge and his friends to try to avoid being forced to incorporate by the mega corps that control the entire economy. Obviously having an unincorporated man who wants to stay unincorporated and tries to get everyone else to believe the same is dangerous to the way the world works now.
Unfortunately, that's all the praise I have for the book. The second half devolves into this mess where fairly important characters end up doing things that have no relevance whatsoever to the story (like Manny Black's relationship) and Justin is just mired in legal battles where he gets saved by some obscure knowledge all orchestrated by certain people who are out to get him (or are they?). Okay, I can live with this constant "not knowing something important to the case and then finding out some bizarre way to win" thing going on...but the ending!
The ending is one hell of a deus ex machina where Justin and company just happen to be at the right place at the right time (why they had to meet like that, who knows), Hector does something that is completely the opposite of the way he's been taunting and annoying people before, and somehow that's supposed to satisfy you. What?! While the ending was predictable (you really only had two options, and there was no way Justin would incorporate), what the heck is that? I was so disappointed to see that situation play out so quickly and so stupidly. It's not a good love story ending, it's not a good revenge-filled ending, it's at most a mediocre attempt to wrap up all the loose ends to get to the future Justin's plans to change the world.
Ultimately it wasn't a bad read, it was just not as good as it could have been.
Unfortunately, that's all the praise I have for the book. The second half devolves into this mess where fairly important characters end up doing things that have no relevance whatsoever to the story (like Manny Black's relationship) and Justin is just mired in legal battles where he gets saved by some obscure knowledge all orchestrated by certain people who are out to get him (or are they?). Okay, I can live with this constant "not knowing something important to the case and then finding out some bizarre way to win" thing going on...but the ending!
The ending is one hell of a deus ex machina where Justin and company just happen to be at the right place at the right time (why they had to meet like that, who knows), Hector does something that is completely the opposite of the way he's been taunting and annoying people before, and somehow that's supposed to satisfy you. What?! While the ending was predictable (you really only had two options, and there was no way Justin would incorporate), what the heck is that? I was so disappointed to see that situation play out so quickly and so stupidly. It's not a good love story ending, it's not a good revenge-filled ending, it's at most a mediocre attempt to wrap up all the loose ends to get to the future Justin's plans to change the world.
Ultimately it wasn't a bad read, it was just not as good as it could have been.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 3, 2019
Two stars for an interesting premise: imagine a world in which every person is incorporated and their value is floated on the market. Now, imagine a dull story. Add dull characters, trite dialog and a healthy dose of anti-government, libertarian bullshit and you have this book. You could honestly read half the book (or less) to get the gist of the idea and then stop because you won’t care a whit about how the thing ends.
June 14, 2022
did not, actually scratch that, COULD not finish. just not an enjoyable read, which stinks because the concept is cool.... but its abysmally executed. it couldnt stop doing things that just didnt work with me at all. on the positive side i made a new shelf?
January 1, 2020
"Stranger in a Strange Land meets Dred Scott" OR "A Libertarian Knife-Fight."
A thoroughly enjoyable and provocative novel about a far-future where government no longer taxes individuals and instead "incorporates" them. Each person being born has 100,000 shares of themselves to sell or keep as they wish (parents keeping 20K and the gov't keeping 5K). As such, most transactions are performed via purchasing shares in other people (ex: I'll build you a house in exchange for 2% of your shares and future earnings). It's a uniquely hyper-libertarian take on the free-market which leaves gov't largely mute while numerous corporations (i.e. those that own most of the stock of most of the people) end up the de facto governing bodies.
Billionaire Justin Cord is a man from our time that was cryogenically frozen several centuries before (due to illness) and is discovered and reanimated. This presents a unique dilemma as he is both extremely wealthy (given the assets he retained) yet also, "unincorporated." Efforts are taken by to force him to "incorporate" -- in the form of corporate pressure, subterfuge, and litigation. Justin's refusal is a catalyst for the dissatisfied sections of society and a threat to the established order.
This book is more about ideas than it is about characters, so while characterization is THIN, the ideas and world-building are so strong that it's forgivable. The most interesting aspect of the novel is that while Justin objects to incorporating on the libertarian principle that it's akin to slavery, the society in which he lives is hyper-libertarian in that everything if governed by private contract and consent. It's the social contract to the extreme with nearly ZERO influence from the gov't. This generates some interesting intellectual conflict.
The third act feels a little hackneyed mostly because it serves as a setup for the following novels and it didn't really need to be. This was a perfectly solid single-volume sci-fi novel in the classic mode. It doesn't need to be a series.
A thoroughly enjoyable and provocative novel about a far-future where government no longer taxes individuals and instead "incorporates" them. Each person being born has 100,000 shares of themselves to sell or keep as they wish (parents keeping 20K and the gov't keeping 5K). As such, most transactions are performed via purchasing shares in other people (ex: I'll build you a house in exchange for 2% of your shares and future earnings). It's a uniquely hyper-libertarian take on the free-market which leaves gov't largely mute while numerous corporations (i.e. those that own most of the stock of most of the people) end up the de facto governing bodies.
Billionaire Justin Cord is a man from our time that was cryogenically frozen several centuries before (due to illness) and is discovered and reanimated. This presents a unique dilemma as he is both extremely wealthy (given the assets he retained) yet also, "unincorporated." Efforts are taken by to force him to "incorporate" -- in the form of corporate pressure, subterfuge, and litigation. Justin's refusal is a catalyst for the dissatisfied sections of society and a threat to the established order.
This book is more about ideas than it is about characters, so while characterization is THIN, the ideas and world-building are so strong that it's forgivable. The most interesting aspect of the novel is that while Justin objects to incorporating on the libertarian principle that it's akin to slavery, the society in which he lives is hyper-libertarian in that everything if governed by private contract and consent. It's the social contract to the extreme with nearly ZERO influence from the gov't. This generates some interesting intellectual conflict.
The third act feels a little hackneyed mostly because it serves as a setup for the following novels and it didn't really need to be. This was a perfectly solid single-volume sci-fi novel in the classic mode. It doesn't need to be a series.
August 2, 2018
Definitely an Intriguing read for sure, especially if you are a fan of economic politics.
I remember hearing once that at the heart of all Science Fiction, and really the basis of what makes Sci-fi what it is, is the question of "what if...?" Science fiction always is a look into the future to try and decipher a billion different "What if"s and soon I'm hoping to further dive into the genre to explore them all.
The "what if" in this book is simple: What if corporations took over running nearly everything. I'll admit that this initial concept actually disgusted me as I almost expected the book to read like a circle jerk of Libertarians getting off on the ultimate Laissez Faire porn. But it was actually much more nuanced than that. In the book, people are "incorporated" which is to say, when they are born they are assigned stocks that are then owned by others (like parents) and sold on an exchange just like stocks in the stock market. There's a good amount of discussions between characters that bring out the good and the bad about this kind of system. For instance, it is made clear in their society that incorporation creates incentive for others to care about people that they have personally invested in, not only socially but also economically when they bought stocks in that person's life. Alternatively, it is shown throughout that this system limits some personal freedom, as your shareholders of your stocks have a say in what you do with your life in order to ensure a Return on Investment (ROI). A lot of drama in this book actually occurs because main characters are not able to do as they please because they do not own a majority of their own stocks and are therefore subject to the will of their shareholders.
If any of that sounds interesting, I'd say it's worth the read because the nuance of the Pros and Cons of that kind of economic humanism is explored in depth multiple times.
However, there's definitely more to it than that. This is a book that I took a lot of time reading, and I'm glad I did because it seemed to have a lot to say. Between the culture's views on the role of government, the horrors depicted relating to Virtual reality, the technological paths of development, and the culture's rejection of the concept of natural death, the book layers on a lot to take in as far as "what ifs". To a certain point, it does tend to get cluttered and there were a couple of (Opinions?..I guess) that didn't feel too relevant to the main thesis of the book. In particular, I'm pretty sure at one point there was a presentation of the internet as a full society of Artificial Intelligence avatars that the humans don't know about, but it was so fleeting that it never felt like a real "what if" argument.
I remember hearing once that at the heart of all Science Fiction, and really the basis of what makes Sci-fi what it is, is the question of "what if...?" Science fiction always is a look into the future to try and decipher a billion different "What if"s and soon I'm hoping to further dive into the genre to explore them all.
The "what if" in this book is simple: What if corporations took over running nearly everything. I'll admit that this initial concept actually disgusted me as I almost expected the book to read like a circle jerk of Libertarians getting off on the ultimate Laissez Faire porn. But it was actually much more nuanced than that. In the book, people are "incorporated" which is to say, when they are born they are assigned stocks that are then owned by others (like parents) and sold on an exchange just like stocks in the stock market. There's a good amount of discussions between characters that bring out the good and the bad about this kind of system. For instance, it is made clear in their society that incorporation creates incentive for others to care about people that they have personally invested in, not only socially but also economically when they bought stocks in that person's life. Alternatively, it is shown throughout that this system limits some personal freedom, as your shareholders of your stocks have a say in what you do with your life in order to ensure a Return on Investment (ROI). A lot of drama in this book actually occurs because main characters are not able to do as they please because they do not own a majority of their own stocks and are therefore subject to the will of their shareholders.
If any of that sounds interesting, I'd say it's worth the read because the nuance of the Pros and Cons of that kind of economic humanism is explored in depth multiple times.
However, there's definitely more to it than that. This is a book that I took a lot of time reading, and I'm glad I did because it seemed to have a lot to say. Between the culture's views on the role of government, the horrors depicted relating to Virtual reality, the technological paths of development, and the culture's rejection of the concept of natural death, the book layers on a lot to take in as far as "what ifs". To a certain point, it does tend to get cluttered and there were a couple of (Opinions?..I guess) that didn't feel too relevant to the main thesis of the book. In particular, I'm pretty sure at one point there was a presentation of the internet as a full society of Artificial Intelligence avatars that the humans don't know about, but it was so fleeting that it never felt like a real "what if" argument.
February 4, 2019
The concept was sort of interesting, but the execution was pretty bad. I was most interested in Sebastian and the other assistants, but that never really got off the ground. I was able to keep reading and be fairly entertained but towards the end, the plot became even more tortured and unlikely.
Also, there was a little bit of random sexism and it seemed like the authors really went out of their way to add it to an otherwise sexism-free future. Just why?
Also, there was a little bit of random sexism and it seemed like the authors really went out of their way to add it to an otherwise sexism-free future. Just why?
February 16, 2011
See the review at http://www.walkerofworlds.com/2011/02...
A brilliant industrialist named Justin Cord awakes from a 300-year cryonic suspension into a world that has accepted an extreme form of market capitalism. It's a world in which humans themselves have become incorporated and most people no longer own a majority of themselves.
Justin Cord is now the last free man in the human race - owned by no one and owning no one.
It’s a premise that Ayn Rand would love and a character that she might have created; a world recovered from the excesses and failures of government she predicted in Atlas Shrugged, at the apex of human achievement due to the capitalist system she loved and trumpeted in her egoist philosophy. And that civilization is at a turning point, due to the extreme nature of this future society’s form of capitalism: individual capitalism.
Justin Cord wakes from a cryogenic sleep to a world where each individual is incorporated at birth, their shares traded on the open market. Using the capital raised through sale of shares, individuals finance their education, business ventures, homes and investments. Corporations—real companies, not just individuals incorporated—are more powerful than governments, produce and regulate their own currency, and control the lives of the individuals in whom they own stock.
And that’s the rub for Cord. For while he is and was an avid defender of capitalism in the 21st century, incorporation of the individual strikes him as a form of slavery. Despite the unprecedented wealth and technological progress it has created, Cord can’t help but see injustice in the system of ownership of others. As he pushes back, fighting against the giant corporations that want to own a piece of him, he begins to reveal cracks and fissures that will lead to systemic change and revolution.
Ostensibly science fiction, The Unincorporated Man makes deft use of futuristic technologies. We see a world of “haves,” who own luxurious homes constantly and fluidly reshaping to the whims of their owners, and “have-nots” who live in “fixed” dwellings of wood and steel and who are lucky to own a small percentage of themselves. Virtual reality has not only been developed to an apex as good and better than reality, with some horrifying results. Artificial intelligence is an integral and essential part of daily life, as is physical mutation by biological manipulation. Death is all but conquered, and even taxes are merely a portion of a person’s share that is allotted to the government at birth. It is, without a doubt, an amazing world.
Without a doubt, in taking principles of market capitalism to their extreme, combined with the most fantastic of futuristic technology, the Kollin brothers have hit upon an idea that is mind-popping in scope. I consider myself to be both very politically active and an ardent fan of the free-market system, but the Kollins kept me guessing, questioning, and reconsidering my assumptions and conclusions about democracy, capitalism, technology, and power. It is a libertarian world they want, and they never shy from promoting that world.
Indeed, if there are any critiques of The Unincorporated Man, it is the message in the novel, not even slightly transparent. The Kollins clearly consider the modern state of government with contempt, especially the “giving something for nothing” that modern government, in the Kollins’ eyes, seems intent to do. Their argument is that of the libertarian: by providing more freedom, more choice, and more capital, they argue, we can create more wealth, not just for the upper echelons of society, but for everyone. When people have incentives to create, they do. When given something for nothing, they do not create. When too much power is accrued to one person or entity, liberty is restricted and destroyed.
This is reinforced when the near utopian society of the far future, rather than continuing on to further glory, begins to fracture under the hubris and weight of unscrupulous and corrupted corporate bureaucrats faced with, as the premise states, one man “owned by no one and owning no one.”
The plot itself wobbles under the clear eyed idealism in the Kollins message. Nothing bad ever seems to happen to Cord. He always comes out on top, losing nothing in the process. Despite being the protagonist, the problems and obstacles that the Kollins set up for him feel almost contrived. As Cord overcomes each, I began to feel like he was like Midas, that everything he touched would turn to gold. He is, as the saying goes, lucky in love and life, and nothing in the story seems to slow that feeling. As a result, the novel occasionally seems to lack the tension that builds and creates tension in the plot and characters.
In spite of the heavy handed message and lack of serious plot tension, the creativity and speculation with which the Kollins create their world gives the novel wings. It’s a world that is alive, vibrant, interesting, and, as science fiction is supposed to be, thought provoking and, occasionally, mind blowing. Most importantly, I enjoyed reading it, and I enjoyed talking about it. I recommend it without reservation.
7/10
A brilliant industrialist named Justin Cord awakes from a 300-year cryonic suspension into a world that has accepted an extreme form of market capitalism. It's a world in which humans themselves have become incorporated and most people no longer own a majority of themselves.
Justin Cord is now the last free man in the human race - owned by no one and owning no one.
It’s a premise that Ayn Rand would love and a character that she might have created; a world recovered from the excesses and failures of government she predicted in Atlas Shrugged, at the apex of human achievement due to the capitalist system she loved and trumpeted in her egoist philosophy. And that civilization is at a turning point, due to the extreme nature of this future society’s form of capitalism: individual capitalism.
Justin Cord wakes from a cryogenic sleep to a world where each individual is incorporated at birth, their shares traded on the open market. Using the capital raised through sale of shares, individuals finance their education, business ventures, homes and investments. Corporations—real companies, not just individuals incorporated—are more powerful than governments, produce and regulate their own currency, and control the lives of the individuals in whom they own stock.
And that’s the rub for Cord. For while he is and was an avid defender of capitalism in the 21st century, incorporation of the individual strikes him as a form of slavery. Despite the unprecedented wealth and technological progress it has created, Cord can’t help but see injustice in the system of ownership of others. As he pushes back, fighting against the giant corporations that want to own a piece of him, he begins to reveal cracks and fissures that will lead to systemic change and revolution.
Ostensibly science fiction, The Unincorporated Man makes deft use of futuristic technologies. We see a world of “haves,” who own luxurious homes constantly and fluidly reshaping to the whims of their owners, and “have-nots” who live in “fixed” dwellings of wood and steel and who are lucky to own a small percentage of themselves. Virtual reality has not only been developed to an apex as good and better than reality, with some horrifying results. Artificial intelligence is an integral and essential part of daily life, as is physical mutation by biological manipulation. Death is all but conquered, and even taxes are merely a portion of a person’s share that is allotted to the government at birth. It is, without a doubt, an amazing world.
Without a doubt, in taking principles of market capitalism to their extreme, combined with the most fantastic of futuristic technology, the Kollin brothers have hit upon an idea that is mind-popping in scope. I consider myself to be both very politically active and an ardent fan of the free-market system, but the Kollins kept me guessing, questioning, and reconsidering my assumptions and conclusions about democracy, capitalism, technology, and power. It is a libertarian world they want, and they never shy from promoting that world.
Indeed, if there are any critiques of The Unincorporated Man, it is the message in the novel, not even slightly transparent. The Kollins clearly consider the modern state of government with contempt, especially the “giving something for nothing” that modern government, in the Kollins’ eyes, seems intent to do. Their argument is that of the libertarian: by providing more freedom, more choice, and more capital, they argue, we can create more wealth, not just for the upper echelons of society, but for everyone. When people have incentives to create, they do. When given something for nothing, they do not create. When too much power is accrued to one person or entity, liberty is restricted and destroyed.
This is reinforced when the near utopian society of the far future, rather than continuing on to further glory, begins to fracture under the hubris and weight of unscrupulous and corrupted corporate bureaucrats faced with, as the premise states, one man “owned by no one and owning no one.”
The plot itself wobbles under the clear eyed idealism in the Kollins message. Nothing bad ever seems to happen to Cord. He always comes out on top, losing nothing in the process. Despite being the protagonist, the problems and obstacles that the Kollins set up for him feel almost contrived. As Cord overcomes each, I began to feel like he was like Midas, that everything he touched would turn to gold. He is, as the saying goes, lucky in love and life, and nothing in the story seems to slow that feeling. As a result, the novel occasionally seems to lack the tension that builds and creates tension in the plot and characters.
In spite of the heavy handed message and lack of serious plot tension, the creativity and speculation with which the Kollins create their world gives the novel wings. It’s a world that is alive, vibrant, interesting, and, as science fiction is supposed to be, thought provoking and, occasionally, mind blowing. Most importantly, I enjoyed reading it, and I enjoyed talking about it. I recommend it without reservation.
7/10
August 28, 2023
Quick review
Interesting premise and world-building, but cringed too often at the dialogue, and skimmed several pages of rationalizing character behavior after the fact.
Not strong enough for me to read the remaining three books.
Interesting premise and world-building, but cringed too often at the dialogue, and skimmed several pages of rationalizing character behavior after the fact.
Not strong enough for me to read the remaining three books.
July 17, 2017
This was pretty good. I liked the novel approach to future society, and all the ramifications. It's clear the authors had thought a lot about the impact of personal incorporation, and I didn't find any aspect that was glossed over or less than well planned out.
August 25, 2012
I'm still debating this one in my head about whether I really liked it or not. I think I'm leaning towards the positive though. Short and sweet summary: I like this book conceptually, though it falls a bit on the short side in execution.
So begin with the good. The concepts are all interesting and contemporary. Cryogenics, some whacky libertarian ideals, throw in some mega-info-corporations, some interesting economic and future dystopian ideas into a pot, stir madly, and simmer until done. All stuff I normally like reading about, even if the mindset and dogma is really a bit shifted from my own. I like keeping the fringe ideas ready at hand to challenge my own thinking. It isn't ok to accept (or refuse) an ideology just because it is different. I'd rather absorb, evaluate and logic through the process and see how things mesh with my own thinking. I liked the treatment of journalists. I liked the idea of self-incorporation and their view of how that might turn out (regardless of how flawed it might be). The ideas are VR, a natural extension (for me) of MUDs, MMOGs and other styles of gaming becomes a wonderful vehicle for a global decline that I thought was pretty novel. All solid stuff.
Ok, so on the negative side, I will say that it is very clear that this is the first offering from fledgling authors. When I read a "first book" by anyone, I know what I'm getting into. Its like listening to "Drums and Wires" by XTC. You can hear the raw talent there, and you know from their later work what kind of pure genius it is going to turn into. I like to imagine that when I'm reading new authors, gauging potential instead of whether they were hatched, fully-formed blockbuster authors from the get go. It keeps me grounded and, well ... humble.
Dialogue is a bit forced. They make what I consider to be a few "classic" new author mistakes, and especially ones dealing with far future. They throw around new words which are generally a morph or mashup of contemporary words as they project they might have changed in the future. Instead of slowly providing context for those words and letting the reader divine for themselves what they might mean, they simply drop the explanation in the narrative. They have a valid excuse that the principle protagonist *is*, in fact, from what we consider modern times, injected into the future via cryogenics. They think that one character (from the future) explaining to this old-world implant in their dialog is an effective way to deliver that content. I disagree.
The characters, while I would say reasonably realized, are fairly wooden and somewhat lacking in detail and personality. Not all, though. As I said, there is real promise here.
Pace was a bit choppy. Not horrible, but there are a few jumps that are notable because they are so obvious. Practice will improve this, methinks. Again, good potential.
One of my main criteria when reading is whether or not the author(s) were able to transport me into their world. On that rating, I would give them about a 50% rating. There were a few scenes that were really well developed, had me really engaged and believing in it. It was the cut scenes and in between areas where I got lost in dialog and no longer felt like I was in their world.
I've read a few critiques of this that felt it was too "preachy" in the principles and dragging people kicking and screaming into their libertarian thinking. I don't agree with that. Some of those things are central premise in the plot. You can't write about this kind of system and not drag your readers through an explanation of how it might have developed and what makes it tick. But really, are you forgetting that the main character doesn't agree with it? Are you forgetting that he is so enigmatic because he can't accept your dogma? Hell (mild spoiler here) even one of the primary (albeit mostly hidden) main characters who is presumably at the very pinnacle of this society doesn't agree with it. Plus, I've ready WAY WAY WAY more preachy books, where I couldn't finish for feeling like I was reading someone's propaganda, and this does NOT elicit that level of ire. Not even close.
All in all, an excellent first offering with some great future thinking and exploration of ideas in a progressive, whacky setting. I do see really solid potential here. I did pick up (but have not yet read) the sequel to this one, and I am looking forward to it. Is it perfect? An example for a whole genre to use as some kind of benchmark? No, and no. Well done, gentlemen. Keep moving forward, keep developing those skills. I'm looking forward to many offerings in the future to watch you prove me right.
So begin with the good. The concepts are all interesting and contemporary. Cryogenics, some whacky libertarian ideals, throw in some mega-info-corporations, some interesting economic and future dystopian ideas into a pot, stir madly, and simmer until done. All stuff I normally like reading about, even if the mindset and dogma is really a bit shifted from my own. I like keeping the fringe ideas ready at hand to challenge my own thinking. It isn't ok to accept (or refuse) an ideology just because it is different. I'd rather absorb, evaluate and logic through the process and see how things mesh with my own thinking. I liked the treatment of journalists. I liked the idea of self-incorporation and their view of how that might turn out (regardless of how flawed it might be). The ideas are VR, a natural extension (for me) of MUDs, MMOGs and other styles of gaming becomes a wonderful vehicle for a global decline that I thought was pretty novel. All solid stuff.
Ok, so on the negative side, I will say that it is very clear that this is the first offering from fledgling authors. When I read a "first book" by anyone, I know what I'm getting into. Its like listening to "Drums and Wires" by XTC. You can hear the raw talent there, and you know from their later work what kind of pure genius it is going to turn into. I like to imagine that when I'm reading new authors, gauging potential instead of whether they were hatched, fully-formed blockbuster authors from the get go. It keeps me grounded and, well ... humble.
Dialogue is a bit forced. They make what I consider to be a few "classic" new author mistakes, and especially ones dealing with far future. They throw around new words which are generally a morph or mashup of contemporary words as they project they might have changed in the future. Instead of slowly providing context for those words and letting the reader divine for themselves what they might mean, they simply drop the explanation in the narrative. They have a valid excuse that the principle protagonist *is*, in fact, from what we consider modern times, injected into the future via cryogenics. They think that one character (from the future) explaining to this old-world implant in their dialog is an effective way to deliver that content. I disagree.
The characters, while I would say reasonably realized, are fairly wooden and somewhat lacking in detail and personality. Not all, though. As I said, there is real promise here.
Pace was a bit choppy. Not horrible, but there are a few jumps that are notable because they are so obvious. Practice will improve this, methinks. Again, good potential.
One of my main criteria when reading is whether or not the author(s) were able to transport me into their world. On that rating, I would give them about a 50% rating. There were a few scenes that were really well developed, had me really engaged and believing in it. It was the cut scenes and in between areas where I got lost in dialog and no longer felt like I was in their world.
I've read a few critiques of this that felt it was too "preachy" in the principles and dragging people kicking and screaming into their libertarian thinking. I don't agree with that. Some of those things are central premise in the plot. You can't write about this kind of system and not drag your readers through an explanation of how it might have developed and what makes it tick. But really, are you forgetting that the main character doesn't agree with it? Are you forgetting that he is so enigmatic because he can't accept your dogma? Hell (mild spoiler here) even one of the primary (albeit mostly hidden) main characters who is presumably at the very pinnacle of this society doesn't agree with it. Plus, I've ready WAY WAY WAY more preachy books, where I couldn't finish for feeling like I was reading someone's propaganda, and this does NOT elicit that level of ire. Not even close.
All in all, an excellent first offering with some great future thinking and exploration of ideas in a progressive, whacky setting. I do see really solid potential here. I did pick up (but have not yet read) the sequel to this one, and I am looking forward to it. Is it perfect? An example for a whole genre to use as some kind of benchmark? No, and no. Well done, gentlemen. Keep moving forward, keep developing those skills. I'm looking forward to many offerings in the future to watch you prove me right.
October 21, 2010
Ever experience travel or a good book that changes the way you look at the world? If you've read "Stranger in a Strange Land" by Robert Heinlein or even "The Time Machine" by H.G. Wells then you may have experienced that out of place aura surrounding a character who's estranged from his world. Try traveling in a foreign country and you'll know the feeling of how it can estrange while exhilarate you at the same time.
The Unincorporated Man creates a fish out of water character in Justin Cord. Cord wakes up from a 300 year cryogenic sleep to a world where humanity has populated the solar system, has developed flying cars, laser driven transports, and near immortality. Yet the strangest part of the brave new world comes in the form of a system of personal incorporation. In the Kollin Brother's 24th century earth, human beings own and sell stock in themselves. So put a 21st century man into such a world and you get a rather interesting story. The Unincorporated Man lives up to its intriguing premise and doesn't at the same time.
The book delivers on plot. Dani and Eytan Kollin took a good idea and fleshed it out - somewhat. They took unconventional turns and spun a yarn about that pits a single man against an enslaving system that ends with a potential victory, but for whom? Well, you'll have to read the next installment, "The Unincorporated War" to find out. The Kollins did a good job and would deserve high marks had it not been for a few of big flaws. First, there's a mystery that arises at the onset of the novel, which will determine everything that happens throughout of the story. This mystery is a key plot point and it's left hanging until the end. Yeah, the reader has to get through nearly 400 pages to resolve the key point. And when the resolution comes around, the reader is made the believe the Justin Cord has been burning and digging around to find the answer when in fact he didn't. It's a neat tie up that nearly worked. A reader might forgive such a mistake in lieu of an interesting story, but while tying up the thread, the authors injected that Justin would have been assassinated countless times and I wondered when those occurrences happened because they would have added so much more intrigue to the story.
There's also some romance in the book and while it's good to have the hero find his future-shock love, it's another thing when the affair is a foregone conclusion. As a reader, I would have preferred something more as in some competition, some intrigue, or a social taboo that never really came into play. So the story didn't quite deliver on Justin's love life for me.
First time and even experienced novelists often make mistakes. In Chapter 4 of the book, the story develops "The Chairman" character as having been born to a wealthy family. He becomes a powerful man who eventually takes over the most powerful corporation in the solar system. The mistake is that by the end, the Chairman's history takes a dramatic change. This is a forgivable inconsistency, but a notable one none the less.
Despite the few flaws and plot development issues, the Unincorporated Man is built around a good story.
The writing on the other hand is full of "to be" verbs and use of the most over used word in writing, "unique".
Overall, I couldn't give this book higher marks because all it had at the end was a interesting plot. I might be alone in my views, but I believe that this story had the potential to be great. Instead it's alright and that's the best I can say.
The Unincorporated Man creates a fish out of water character in Justin Cord. Cord wakes up from a 300 year cryogenic sleep to a world where humanity has populated the solar system, has developed flying cars, laser driven transports, and near immortality. Yet the strangest part of the brave new world comes in the form of a system of personal incorporation. In the Kollin Brother's 24th century earth, human beings own and sell stock in themselves. So put a 21st century man into such a world and you get a rather interesting story. The Unincorporated Man lives up to its intriguing premise and doesn't at the same time.
The book delivers on plot. Dani and Eytan Kollin took a good idea and fleshed it out - somewhat. They took unconventional turns and spun a yarn about that pits a single man against an enslaving system that ends with a potential victory, but for whom? Well, you'll have to read the next installment, "The Unincorporated War" to find out. The Kollins did a good job and would deserve high marks had it not been for a few of big flaws. First, there's a mystery that arises at the onset of the novel, which will determine everything that happens throughout of the story. This mystery is a key plot point and it's left hanging until the end. Yeah, the reader has to get through nearly 400 pages to resolve the key point. And when the resolution comes around, the reader is made the believe the Justin Cord has been burning and digging around to find the answer when in fact he didn't. It's a neat tie up that nearly worked. A reader might forgive such a mistake in lieu of an interesting story, but while tying up the thread, the authors injected that Justin would have been assassinated countless times and I wondered when those occurrences happened because they would have added so much more intrigue to the story.
There's also some romance in the book and while it's good to have the hero find his future-shock love, it's another thing when the affair is a foregone conclusion. As a reader, I would have preferred something more as in some competition, some intrigue, or a social taboo that never really came into play. So the story didn't quite deliver on Justin's love life for me.
First time and even experienced novelists often make mistakes. In Chapter 4 of the book, the story develops "The Chairman" character as having been born to a wealthy family. He becomes a powerful man who eventually takes over the most powerful corporation in the solar system. The mistake is that by the end, the Chairman's history takes a dramatic change. This is a forgivable inconsistency, but a notable one none the less.
Despite the few flaws and plot development issues, the Unincorporated Man is built around a good story.
The writing on the other hand is full of "to be" verbs and use of the most over used word in writing, "unique".
Overall, I couldn't give this book higher marks because all it had at the end was a interesting plot. I might be alone in my views, but I believe that this story had the potential to be great. Instead it's alright and that's the best I can say.
April 8, 2021
Imagine a society 300 years distant from ours entirely operated by corporations. The second your mother gives birth to you, you become an incorporated being. No, that’s not a typo. Of course, you are a corporeal being because you have a physical body. No, I mean you become incorporated, and corporate overlords assign you 100 shares of stock at your birth—stock in you. Your parents get 20 percent of your shares, and the government gets five percent. The other 75 percent goes to the corporation in charge of your society, and it decides how you grow up and what your opportunities are. You can increase your value by making good decisions, and you can buy shares of friends and strangers until you amass enough credits to purchase yourself back—or at least a majority of yourself. You can never own 100 percent of yourself—that’s the rules of the society. Until you own a 70-percent super-majority block of shares in you, the corporation and your shareholders largely dictate your life. Ah, but the technology is wonderful. Nanotechnology exists so thoroughly that your life gets extended by hundreds of years. Elevators are tubes into which you step and move at rapid rates. There are no doors; walls are permeable so that a hand in the right place opens the hole through which you walk. Cars fly at hundreds of miles an hour. There is no U.S. government. Instead, corporations and the government operate the Earth and all of the outer planets on which former Earthlings dwell. If poverty is your lot at birth, you become a penny stock, traded at low value, and you may never get beyond that.
Three hundred years before the book begins, Justin Cord learns he will soon die from terminal cancer. He is an extraordinarily successful 21st-century businessman, and his money purchases a magnificent cryochamber filled with redundant systems designed to preserve him in death for as long as it takes to find a cure. He hid himself so well that it took three centuries and a minor to unearth his body. Because of his time and the circumstances of his birth, Cord is the only free man in the universe. No one can buy shares because he never had them.
He falls in love with his revivalist, and that’s taboo in that society. For lots of reasons, he is a dangerous man. He reintroduces the society to the concept of freedom. The ensuing civil war that erupts when his ideas of individualism and freedom take hold is inevitable.
I liked this book, but most of you won’t. Justin is Ayn Rand’s John Galt. This is up to the crown of its literary head in libertarian philosophy, so if you oppose that thinking or perhaps would love to be your own corporation, you probably want to give this a hard pass.
The book is a bit too long; Justin Cord is a bit too perfect; the females aren’t complex—think Heinlein—and the bad guys are almost caricatures. Still, I love the concept of individual freedom and pushing back against oppression whether it be corporate or governmental.
Three hundred years before the book begins, Justin Cord learns he will soon die from terminal cancer. He is an extraordinarily successful 21st-century businessman, and his money purchases a magnificent cryochamber filled with redundant systems designed to preserve him in death for as long as it takes to find a cure. He hid himself so well that it took three centuries and a minor to unearth his body. Because of his time and the circumstances of his birth, Cord is the only free man in the universe. No one can buy shares because he never had them.
He falls in love with his revivalist, and that’s taboo in that society. For lots of reasons, he is a dangerous man. He reintroduces the society to the concept of freedom. The ensuing civil war that erupts when his ideas of individualism and freedom take hold is inevitable.
I liked this book, but most of you won’t. Justin is Ayn Rand’s John Galt. This is up to the crown of its literary head in libertarian philosophy, so if you oppose that thinking or perhaps would love to be your own corporation, you probably want to give this a hard pass.
The book is a bit too long; Justin Cord is a bit too perfect; the females aren’t complex—think Heinlein—and the bad guys are almost caricatures. Still, I love the concept of individual freedom and pushing back against oppression whether it be corporate or governmental.
June 30, 2015
This book was big on ideas, but unfortunately that's all it was big on. Characters and plot seemed secondary to the authors getting a chance to lecture the reader with underdeveloped thoughts on politics, economics, and society.
As the description says, this book is about a man--Justin Cord--from the early 21st century who emerges from spending 300 years in hypersleep/stasis to find a world in which everyone is incorporated at birth--that is, just as when companies go public, each person comes into the world with 100,000 shares of themselves. The ultimate goal for a given individual is thus to obtain 51% of their own portfolio and gain more control over their life.
Sadly, the political theory in the book reads very pedestrian. The authors' poor writing doesn't help much, and at times it feels like they're getting on a soapbox just to stand on a soapbox. The Kollins try unsuccessfully to evoke Robert Heinlein, much to the detriment of the concepts at play.
From a pure story-telling perspective the book also leaves much to be desired. The authors hark on 9/11--revealing how much of the book was written immediately after the WTC attacks--but never bother to update the perspective to better fit with the 2009 release date of the book. They rely on overused plot elements (again, trying desperately to be Heinlein) and generally fail to establish the rules of their world. For example, two trials involving the titular character are central to the plot of the novel, yet one never feels any apprehension over the possible outcome because one never gets an understanding of the legal issues at hand. In other words, the Kollins remain one step above a deus ex machina in resolving the dramatic tension they attempt to create.
Overall, The Unincorporated Man has the beginnings of some good ideas, but ultimately falls short. Sections feel entirely too long for what's at hand; and at times it feels like the authors just want to throw a bunch of ideas out to populate their world and take up more space.
The end result is something that may have worked better as a short story or even a novella, but doesn't have the depth to fill out a long novel. Or at least not as the authors present it.
As the description says, this book is about a man--Justin Cord--from the early 21st century who emerges from spending 300 years in hypersleep/stasis to find a world in which everyone is incorporated at birth--that is, just as when companies go public, each person comes into the world with 100,000 shares of themselves. The ultimate goal for a given individual is thus to obtain 51% of their own portfolio and gain more control over their life.
Sadly, the political theory in the book reads very pedestrian. The authors' poor writing doesn't help much, and at times it feels like they're getting on a soapbox just to stand on a soapbox. The Kollins try unsuccessfully to evoke Robert Heinlein, much to the detriment of the concepts at play.
From a pure story-telling perspective the book also leaves much to be desired. The authors hark on 9/11--revealing how much of the book was written immediately after the WTC attacks--but never bother to update the perspective to better fit with the 2009 release date of the book. They rely on overused plot elements (again, trying desperately to be Heinlein) and generally fail to establish the rules of their world. For example, two trials involving the titular character are central to the plot of the novel, yet one never feels any apprehension over the possible outcome because one never gets an understanding of the legal issues at hand. In other words, the Kollins remain one step above a deus ex machina in resolving the dramatic tension they attempt to create.
Overall, The Unincorporated Man has the beginnings of some good ideas, but ultimately falls short. Sections feel entirely too long for what's at hand; and at times it feels like the authors just want to throw a bunch of ideas out to populate their world and take up more space.
The end result is something that may have worked better as a short story or even a novella, but doesn't have the depth to fill out a long novel. Or at least not as the authors present it.
June 29, 2016
The Unincorporated Man, by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin, 2009. It's long, at nearly 500 pages, and presents a dystopian world entirely based around an idea of economist Milton Friedman: everyone in the future is incorporated at birth. Their parents get 20%, the government gets 5%, the rest of the shares are traded on the open market. Your majority shareholders determine what education you receive, where you live, what career you must pursue, even your diet. The life goal of each person is to earn enough money to buy back a majority of their shares and gain some control over their lives. Into this world comes Justin Cord, a billionaire libertarian from the 21st century who cryogenically preserved himself when he learned he had cancer. He has prepared for almost everything, including hiding treasure troves around the world so that he can bring his wealth with him into the future. The one thing he was unprepared for was personal incorporation. To Cord, the idea amounts to slavery and he'll have nothing to do with it. This sets him up for an ongoing fight with the world government and a much more powerful entity known as GCI, the corporation that controls cryogenic medicine and claims to own a share of Cord, since they found him and restored him to health. Cord must fight court battles, financial battles, assassination attempts, and political conspiracies along the way.
Overall, I enjoyed the book and recommend it. The book is a first effort by the authors and shows signs here and there of inexperienced writing. The authors seem to have no clue about the hard sciences, so they rightly avoid them as much as possible and stick to things like economics and sociology. The few times the plots requires any science stuff, they borrow old ideas from 20th century futurists (e.g. "grey goo" from Eric Drexler) or prior science fiction. The book ends with a bit of a cliff-hanger, hoping to sell you on a series of three sequels. Unfortunately, reviews of the three following books seem uniformly bad, so I'm going to stop with this one.
Overall, I enjoyed the book and recommend it. The book is a first effort by the authors and shows signs here and there of inexperienced writing. The authors seem to have no clue about the hard sciences, so they rightly avoid them as much as possible and stick to things like economics and sociology. The few times the plots requires any science stuff, they borrow old ideas from 20th century futurists (e.g. "grey goo" from Eric Drexler) or prior science fiction. The book ends with a bit of a cliff-hanger, hoping to sell you on a series of three sequels. Unfortunately, reviews of the three following books seem uniformly bad, so I'm going to stop with this one.
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