Author: J.J. Green
Date: 2018
Publisher: Infinite Books
Quote: "Their planet had no name, but they were about to fix that."
There are three subgroups of people in the space colony: the Woken, who made the space flight in cryogenetic storage and survived, a tiny minority of the number that left Earth; the Gens, who were born on their new planet; and the Guardians, whose social role doesn't quite fit with everything else. The Woken are thought to be about six generations' worth of time older than the Gens but, having spent all those years frozen in space, they act and feel only slightly older. The Woken wrote the Manual of rules for the colony and tend to feel that the Gens are more junior, less competent, than they really are. The Gens tend to resent the Woken's seniority.
In this longish novel the whole colony share some adventures that unify all of them, even--after a few armed confrontations--the Guardians. No points for guessing that they'll call their planet Concordia.
Trouble started in the opening scene when the original planet-naming ceremony was disrupted. Trouble resumes, years later, when one of the Woken--she survived with some neurological damage, losing natural vision and seeing with a high-tech brain enhancement, and some of "the crueler Gens" joke about her having eyes in the back of her head--starts control-freaking, among other things imposing a gun ban. Friends tell her she's losing touch with reality, but she makes matters worse by insisting that they reactivate a wealthy egomaniac who was known, on Earth, for his ability "to wheel and deal," guessing that he'll do better at marketing authoritarian government than she will. If certain Prime Ministers or Presidents come to mind, as long as they're the ones who were on people's minds in 2018 the resemblance may be intentional. Let present-time PM's and Presidents. and their partisans, make the most of this little fable.
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