The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 4 March 1998
by Kim Stanley Robinson
This book is a part of Robinson's Three Californias trilogy, presenting three different futures for Orange County; nuclear war, environmental decay, or ecotopia. Pacific Edge describes a utopian future for Southern California and the country. The book is set in 2065, after a slow and progressive socialist revolution has swept through America and some other countries. The plot, though, centers in a small town trying to save a last piece of open space from development. Slowly, perceptions and social structures have changed, but not entirely. Corporations are governmentally limited in size, but they find some ways to get around that, particularly by working with less-progressive countries. Complex issues of California water and environmental policy, growth, money and small-town interpersonal conflict are involved in this story. The book would be less interesting, though, if it were not set deep in the next century. It actually felt somewhat boring getting started. The story and the characters are from everyday life and could be set in 1975 as easily as 2065. But the futuristic aspects save the tale. Robinson, who clearly loves Orange County, has set out to describe a world in which elements of a practical utopia have come to pass. He does a remarkable job at that, making his future believable. Yet, I wouldn't describe the resulting tale as science-fiction. Technology has contributed to the new future, but is not a central theme of the book beyond some enjoyable architectural details. Finally, the "climax" of the book appears as a single chapter that seems incongruous to the story. Overall, a good book, an interesting book, but not an exciting book.
Also by Robinson: [The Gold Coast] [The Wild Shore] [Antarctica] [The Blind Geometer]
[Other Books in or about California]
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