Cory Doctorow 3 hr 31 min read

In a near future where people organize into globe-spanning tribes by time zone rather than nation, a happiness-engineer plots against his own side, from inside a mental institution.

Cory Doctorow's 2004 novel is a witty, fast cyberpunk-flavored tale of loyalty, sabotage, and identity in a hyper-connected world, praised by Gibson and Ellis. Sharp, funny, contemporary. Read it for an inventive early-2000s vision of tribal allegiances and one man's very bad, very clever week.

In its time

Published in 2004, during the 2000s, open-culture and post-scarcity visions.

Reading it

3 hr 31 min read (a novel-length work, settle in).