A Song Called Youth

• An Introduction • Richard Kadrey

There’s an old saw that SF is really about dissecting the present and not about looking at the future, and that’s true as far as it goes. Sometimes though, SF can’t help but lift the future’s skirts for a peek underneath. Look at 1984 and its description of a Total Surveillance society. Brave New World’s look at genetic engineering. Star Trek practically engineered modern smart phones. Hell, both H.G. Wells’ “The World Set Free” and Superman described atomic bombs. John Shirley’s A Song Called Youth trilogy—the novels Eclipse, Eclipse Penumbra, and Eclipse Corona—is another piece of SF that spray-painted a glimpse of the future on the cave wall without knowing it.

We’re living at a strange moment in history. “Interesting times,” as the Chinese call it in their famously charming curse. We want power to make our TVs glow and medicine to save our decaying asses but we hate smart people. We whine about Arab oil but go NIMBY when it comes to large-scale alternative energy projects. We want the government to stay the hell out of our lives but we want it to ban gay marriage and porn and to keep that witch-loving Harry Potter from dragging our kids to the devil through the school library. We want reassurance and safety at all cost and we’ll suck down snake oil from any carny with a good pitch.

John Shirley saw over the horizon to the post-9/11 fear and loathing idiotscape where the Constitution, the Geneva Convention, and government itself have become mere formalities. Where for-rent mercenaries guard us as long as the money flows and where our desperate need for a strong leader makes the shit sandwich of fascism look a little tastier every day.

And he did it twenty years ago.

The A Song Called Youth trilogy is the story of the world we’re knee deep in. And like the best rock and roll it kicks down the walls and busts up the furniture when the action starts and makes you think when you slow down long enough to listen to the words. Living in stupid times doesn’t mean you have to be stupid. And maybe with some cunning, crazy-ass energy and balls maybe you can turn things around and make the world a little less stupid. A little less dangerous. A little less suicidal. Hell, that’s pretty much what life is and it’s what A Song Called Youth is about.