American War

Ugh. This book bothered me. BOTHERED ME.

There's been a swath of edgy, insightful, “cutting too close to the bone” near-future dystopian books about America lately. Namely: The Underground Railroad (where said railroad is literally true), Underground Airlines (alt history where slavery never ended), Exit West (magical portals facilitate Syrian refugee crisis), and this.

The concept of this is great, and I was super pumped to read it. It's a near-future book about a second American civil war, this one driven by climate change. My spirits were a little dampened by the less-than-great reviews it was getting, but NO MATTER. I love alt history dystopias. I LOVE THEM. I will read them.

But I was really bothered by this book. It seemed so dark as to be almost mean-spirited, and so cynical in its portrayal of America's problems as to be, ahem, reminiscent of provincial Euro-snobs who reduce America to “guns and religion” clingers. There was no nuance, only pessimism. Every character was a vile caricature; there was no kindness, not even method to the madness!

It's rare that a book upsets me like this, but I found myself deeply disturbed by the values portrayed in this book. Yes, America has done some shitty things (if countries can “do” things) - slavery, Guantanamo, Bush, the Dulles brothers, police brutality, Trump. The list can go on. But (A) are there morally good countries? If so, please let me know, let's all move there. And (2) if we accept the premise of there being “shitty countries”, then what of all the people that live there?

Cuz this book is about a shitty America which has made its bed and GODDAMN IT, WILL LIE IN IT. It's the end of the 21st century. Climate change has decimated the coasts; the Federal government has moved in-land to Columbus, Ohio, and most of the South is underwater. Texas and California are back in Mexico's hands, and a civil war is raging between the Blues (northerners/Democrats/liberals/what have you) and Reds (southerners/Republicans). The war ostensibly began when the government passed a clean energy bill. “YOU WILL NEVER TAKE AWAY MY FOSSIL FUELS!” the South cried, as it seceded. Thus beganeth the war.

Our protagonist, Sarat, is a tough “tomboy” (SCARE QUOTES) who grows up in the Louisiana bayou with her two siblings and parents. Shit is hard in this near future South, and the family escapes the civil war's front lines, ending up in a refugee camp. There, horrible shit happens, Sarat is radicalized, and then she does lots and lots of horrible shit. There is a prolonged stretch in a Guantanamo Bay-style prison. The book ends on a feeble note of hope - oh wait, no, never mind, it ends with just pure misanthropy.

Ugghghhh. I feel like the reason this book didn't click for me, and I found the dystopian darkness stupid and repellant, rather than edgy and smart, was that it presented - at its core - an unbelievable and stereotyped vision of the US. Another Goodreads reviewer noted, accurately, that the politics don't feel real. Future South is completely post-race and post-religion, but it still hates the “Blues” - and hates them over fossil fuel usage? I'm sorry, but I cannot buy that 90 years from now, racism will magically disappear and be supplanted by fossil fuel outrage. Also, this is a nitpick, but the family's last name - Chestnut - also felt weird. Who is named Chestnut? It felt like the author randomly picked an English word; it felt like the way I used to write shitty Orientalist sci-fi and randomly google Urdu or Hindi words and name my characters after them because AUTHENTICITY (“Sanjeev Biryani”, I am sorry).

I felt like the book is marketed as a nuanced, dystopian look at America's problems, but instead it's about Syria, Iraq, and - more generally - the horrors of war, radicalization, and terror. Which would be fine. COULD BE FINE. But the hollowed-out presentation of American society, denuded of its history and painted in stark, misanthropic ways, was just - ugh.