Wednesday, August 5, 2015

"The Declaration" by Gemma Malley

I liked this dystopian novel. The main events are set in the future, year 2140, 70 years after pharma company had discovered medicine (some kind of stem cells) that allowed the people live forever without ageing.  

However there is a catch. Since people live forever, there is extreme fear of overpopulation. This led to enactment of law called "declaration" where people declare that they would accept longevity at the expense never to have children. 

A child who is born from people who have signed the declaration but ended up anyway with a child, is called a surplus. In this future society surpluses have no right and treated as a servant slaves. Surpluses are hunted down by Catcher, a brutal secret service with omnipotent power over both surpluses and even legals. Surpluses are thought to think about themselves as a burden to the society and to hate the parents who are criminally negligent for allowing surplus to be born in the first place.

For some reason, this dystopian future is characterized by energy deficiency.

As it always happens, there are enough people who consider declaration law to be against the law of nature and who form underground movement to counteract governmental oppression.

In my view this novel is remarkably good. There is nothing extra in it. The author nicely captures the transformation of surplus Anne undergoes from obedient servant into free thinker and explains what motivates such changes. 

David Usharauli



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