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356 pages, Hardcover
First published March 19, 2019
I realized I might never know what really happened here. War was all about the annihilation of truth. Every good dictator and CEO knows that.
"You accept reality," my father said. "This reality. That will keep you safe for now, my little mouse. But promise me that when you come of age you'll ask questions. Promise me you'll strive for some other future than the one we gave you."
"It's important that we tell ourselves stories, Private Dietz. There's a theory that consciousness itself begins with story. Stories are how we make sense of the world."
“I suppose it’s an old story, isn’t it? The oldest story. It’s the dark against the light. The dark is always the easier path. Power. Domination. Blind obedience. Fear always works to build order, in the short term. But it can’t last. Fear doesn’t inspired anything like love does.”
“I believe there’s sometimes a greater evil that must be vanquished. But more often than we’d like to admit, there is no greater evil, just an exchange of one set of oppressive horrors with another. Wars are for old people. For rich people. For people protected by the perpetuation of horrors on others.”
“Don’t tell me every revolution is peaceful. Revolutions rely on the tireless work of faceless masses whose lives mean so little individually that their names weren’t known to their movements even when alive.”
“The heroes were always the ordinary people who pursued extraordinary change.”
“The corps were rich enough to provide for everyone. They chose not to, because the existence of places like the labor camps outside Sao Paulo ensured there was a life worse than the one they offered. If you gave people mashed protein cakes when their only other option was to eat horseshit, they would call you a hero and happily eat your tasteless mash. They would throw down their lives for you. Give up their souls.”
“Don’t just fight the darkness, friends. Let’s be the light.” – Kameron Hurley
“War was all about the annihilation of truth. Every good dictator and CEO knows that.”Disclaimer: I am a card-carrying pacifist. I refuse to understand or accept any glorification or romanticization of war. War is hell, a meatgrinder of horror, and I firmly subscribe to the school of thought of “The worst peace is better than the best war”, as my mother often says.
“I still believe in the military. I believe there’s sometimes a greater evil that must be vanquished. But more often than we’d like to admit, there is no greater evil, just an exchange of one set of oppressive horrors with another. Wars are for old people. For rich people. For people protected by the perpetuation of horrors on others.”This book, however, is vastly different and nothing at all like what I was expecting. Far from glorification of war and aggression and violence, it is a strong critique of it, a fight against the eternal fight, the denouncement of neverending war. War is hell and little else, no glorification needed here. It ended up being a brutal uncompromising mindfuck, condemning not just war itself, but rampant capitalism and greed and conditional human rights. It ended up being a brutal read that I could not tear my eyes from.
“Don’t just fight the darkness. Bring the light.”————
Or, as Sir Terry Pratchett once wrote, “Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.”
“They said the war would turn us into light.”
“I didn’t think about what would happen after I signed up. Or who I would need to become. I thought the world was simple: good guys and bad guys, citizens and ghouls, corporate patriots and socialist slaves.
You were with us or against us.
Pick your side.”
“You give a human being freedom and personhood as some innate right, and what do they have to fight for? Personhood is earned. Residency is earned. Citizenship is earned. If you’re not earning for the company, you are costing it.”
“The corps were rich enough to provide for everyone. They chose not to, because the existence of places like the labor camps outside São Paulo ensured there was a life worse than the one they offered. If you gave people mashed protein cakes when their only other option was to eat horseshit, they would call you a hero and happily eat your tasteless mash. They would throw down their lives for you. Give up their souls.”
“There was a time when human beings believed they were their governments. They understood they had power over them, because they created them. They did not simply wait around for their governments to give them rights and freedoms. They demanded them. People should not be afraid of the corporations. Corporations should be afraid of the people.”
“Let me tell you how they break you.
You are shit. Everything you do is shit. From the minute you step off the transport at the training base in Mendoza, you aren’t doing anything right. You don’t walk right. Look right. Talk right. You are a bag of human excrement. No one likes you, let alone loves you. In great shape? It’s not enough. Smart? That’s worse. Nothing is ever good enough for the Corporate Corps. They want blind obedience.
After a week of that, you’re hungry for anything. Hungry for a “That’s right,” or a “Good job.” You want love, acceptance. Humans want connection. I thought that was bullshit until mandatory training. I didn’t believe we were all bags of meat propelled by emotion, but I was wrong. The DIs know. They know exactly what we are, and how to play us.
That’s how they teach you to kill.”
“You think you can change what happens, if you know what I know? Let me tell you something. Everything that’s going to happen has already happened. You just haven’t experienced it yet. We are, all of us, caught within a massive loop of time, bouncing around in the spaces between things.”
“What I learned, as I looked back on those times, was that the lies are what sustained us. The lies kept us going. Gave us hope. Without lies we have to face the truth long before we are ready for it.
Long before we are prepared to fight it.”
“Believing lies just makes everything ... easier, when those lies prop up your worldview.”
“Who were we really fighting?
They don’t like us to ask questions. They try to train it out of you, not just if you’re a corporate soldier, but for citizens and residents, too. The corp knows best, right?”
“People would believe whatever you put in front of them, if it fit their understanding of the world.”
“That’s the war I knew. The events as I understood them. That’s how I decided which side of the war to be on. And I was. On the right side, I mean.
Nobody ever thinks they chose the wrong side.
We all think we’re made of light.”
“This is something we don’t talk about . . . what happens when you are presented with a truth that contradicts everything you believe in?”
“But it turns out most of us don’t want truth. We want stories that back up our existing beliefs.”
“This is not the end. There are other worlds. Other stars. Other futures. Maybe we’ll do better out there. Maybe when they have a war again, no one will come.
Maybe they will be full of light.”
[...] there’s this thing called escalation of commitment. That once people have invested a certain amount of time in a project, they won’t quit, even if it’s no longer a good deal.
2020 Hugo Award Finalists