pamur wrote:I just finished reading a book by Paolo Bacigalupi called "The Windup Girl" that I would carefully recommend to the Peak Oil audience. The story takes place in Thailand after the Industrial Expansion (and the resulting contraction) with hydrocarbons no longer available and the consequences of global warming have done their thing to the planet. It is not a pretty sight. But Mr. Bacigalupi manages to conjure up a world that still is able to support an industrial base using bio-engineered beasts of burden, laborers and foodstuffs. Energy is pulled out of bio-engineered mastodons, springs (spring guns) and hand cranks (treadle computers), calories are the medium of exchange and big corporations actually do run the world. The story is slow at first, the characters are not very likable and it gets a bit heavy and dark at times but it is a very different and imaginative spin on post peak possibilities.
Loki wrote:Hey, slow down there Pamur, 7 posts in 7 years
pamur wrote:I really hope to hear what any of you may have to say about this book. Science fiction has really dropped the ball when it comes to post-oil conjecture.
Sixstrings wrote:
Well I ordered the book off Amazon, it arrived a few days ago and I'm 80 pages into it.
So far so good. It's actually not a depressing read.. I've avoided "The Road" just because the story sounds so damn grim, so I'm glad this is a fun read so far.
In Thailand, they created a new animal based on elephants called megodonts. They use the beasts for kinetic power, pulling crank shafts powering the factories and such.
pamur wrote:The story gets a little more grizzly as you get into it, and at times a little over the top, but it definitely sets a bar for post-oil fiction.
TheDude wrote:In the past we have used animals for limited energy sources in a stationary position, I should add - Eugene Sloane depicts various animals on treadmills or tracks, horses or even dogs powering things like saws, corn sieves, or small grist mills. Powering a whole factory would be a horse of another stripe.
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