So, i was recommended a book called “Docile” by K.M Szpara and was sold by it from the way an employee at a book store talked about the plot. the tagline in the cover, “there is no consent under capitalism” caught my attention immediately, and i was really excited about the book because the plot seemed like something new and refreshing. i’m about a quarter or so into the book and it really just seems like intense smut with some sparse commentary on corporate politics. i want to find a book to shake me up, something with more depth. if i have to put it down for a few days, even better.
by yellowfishie
9 Comments
Here are some you might like:
* Starfish by Peter Watts. First in a series. Very dark. There is some sex but I would absolutely not call it smut. The relationships are all very dysfunctional. Be warned that there is sexual violence in this series, both characters talking about it happening in the past, and an on-the-page depiction in the third book. Edit: forgot to mention [these are available as free ebooks on the author’s website](https://rifters.com/real/shorts.htm)
* The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin. A great classic about a physicist from a communist society traveling to a capitalist society.
* Autonomous by Annalee Newitz. Sci fi about big, evil corporations doing shady things. I like that this book depicts scientists as people trying to figure something out, whether they have pure motives or are motivated by greed. Lots of sci fi depicts scientists as evil or ignorant, but I feel the way this book distinguishes corporate employees vs. academic scientists vs. health researchers to be done well.
Eclipse by Ophelia Rue
Ship of Fools by Richard Russo
Swan Song by Robert McCammon
Not sure if it’s exactly what you’re looking for, but I’d check out Anne Bishop, specifically the series that starts with “Daughter of the Blood”.
Other authors would be Mira Grant (check out her series that starts with “Feed”) and Joe Abercrombie. You may also like some of Stephen Kings more thriller stuff vs straight horror (like “The Stand”). Standalone’s off the top of my head, “For Your Own Good” by Samantha Downing and “Positive” by David Wellington.
Dark and dystopian, but not really a mind-fuck: The Past is Red by Catheryn Vallente.
From what I’ve gathered, Blood Meridian and The Road might do the trick.
(And just a warning, if anyone says The Silent Patient or Dark Matter, don’t believe them. Those are airport thrillers at best – the kind you buy half price at the airport, read, and abandon them on holiday. There’s certainly an audience for them, but from your post, that audience is not you.)
Snow crash might be worth a try. Neal Stephenson is the author.
**There Is No Antimemetics Division** by qntm (<– yea that’s the author’s real pen name) really threw me for a loop mentally.
An antimeme is an idea with self-censoring properties; an idea which, by its intrinsic nature, discourages or prevents people from spreading it. Antimemes are real. Think of any piece of information which you wouldn’t share with anybody, like passwords, taboos and dirty secrets. Or any piece of information which would be difficult to share even if you tried: complex equations, very boring passages of text, large blocks of random numbers, and dreams… But anomalous antimemes are another matter entirely. How do you contain something you can’t record or remember? How do you fight a war against an enemy with effortless, perfect camouflage, when you can never even know that you’re at war? Welcome to the Antimemetics Division. No, this is not your first day.
For something a bit less mind-f-y, but still dark and dystopian, check out **The Mountain in the Sea** by Ray Nayler. Explore the nature of consciousness across several different converging plot-lines. Set in a dark near future.
*Oryx and Crake* by Margaret Atwood may fit the bill here. I’ve only read it but there are two more books in the series and I hear good things.