The premise of this novel is an interesting one: in the near future, in an overdeveloped Orange County, California, a dissatisfied poet becomes involved with industrial terrorists bent on subverting the war and weapons industry, in which his father is employed. But the writing is stilted and disjointed and interrupted at odd points by rather nonsensical poems. And Robinson’s vision of the future doesn’t ring true either. Even writing at the end of the 1980s and able to foresee sprawl run amuck and auto-piloted cars on unending freeways, he still completely overlooks the importance of the Internet or digital information in future society. The presence of videotapes and CDs in Robinson’s 2027 now makes the novel seem hopelessly dated.

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