The Fortunate Fall (novel)

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The Fortunate Fall is the debut and only novel by Raphael Carter, published by Tor Books in 1996. It plays with a number of literary themes and elements, but can be broadly categorized as "postcyberpunk", i.e. science fiction dealing with the consequences of a drastically computerized and networked society, however with much more direct experience with IT and without thematic limitations of first-wave cyberpunk.^[1] The main character is Maya Andreyeva, a "camera" for a major news network in a 24th century after the fall of an US world empire, where every nation is a third-rate power except hypertechnological Africa, which requires a blood test of aspiring immigrants. The title comes from the Christian theological concept of felix culpa.

The Fortunate Fall was well received (a. o. Locus recommended reading list and Nebula Award for Best Novel preliminary nominee; in the Locus Award it was 4th among first novels, after two tied winners) and caused Carter to be nominated for John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 1997 and 1998.

[edit] Plot summary

As a "camera", Maya is heavily wired with sensory and telecommunications gear so that she can broadcast her perceptions, combining the functions of an on-location reporter and her camera crew, presenting both audiovisual data and its interpretation. (Related concepts include simstim in William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy, or the "gargoyles" of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash.)

Carter uses her protagonist's occupation as a focal point for analyzing the role of the media in packaging, selling, and, thus shaping history and historical truth. The reader is taken through not only the familiar slanted research and writing of a piece, but also the careful cooking of raw sense data for broadcast by a screener, the one person who experiences the camera's full sense experience, precisely so that others do not. The screeners experience high turnover because of their unfortunate tendency to identify too closely, and fall in love, with the cameras who cannot share their unidirectional intimacy. The novel begins with Maya finding herself saddled with a new and problematic screener - one who appears to her only through the net, never in person, and who is a woman, contrary to all custom in her heterocentric dystopia.

In the virtual company of this mysterious woman, Maya grapples with conspiracy, totalitarianism, mind control, race, sexuality, as well as the nature of the mind and free will.

[edit] See also

• Cyberpunk
• Lesbian science fiction

[edit] References

Patrick and Teresa Nielsen Hayden: "Anatomy of a Sale: Raphael Carter's The Fortunate Fall to Tor Books." In The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writer's Sourcebook, 2nd ed., ed. David Borcherding. Cincinnati: Writer's Digest Press, 1996. ISBN 0-89879-762-4

1. ^ Lawrence Person's 1998 Notes Toward a Postcyberpunk Manifesto started to define the subgenre, and listed The Fortunate Fall as 10th of 13 particular examples.

• The Fortunate Fall publication history at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database