But part of me fears that Robinson underestimates not just the staying power of the status quo but also the odds that when things get really bad, we will react really badly. It's possible that a killer heat wave striking India might begin to wake up the conscience of the world; it's also possible that it makes the emergence of the next round of Trumps and Bolsonaros and Modis more likely.
If the COVID pandemic is a kind of early test of our ability to respond to crisis, some parts of the world seem to have passed and others seem to have failed. Can the US achieve the kind of unity that might make it an ally in this greatest of fights? In Robinson's novel, the valiant people of Hong Kong not only hold off Beijing but manage to help change the flavor of its government -- at the moment, that river seems to be flowing the other way. And the change that must come must come rapidly: even one more wasted decade may be enough to put us past the point where the momentum of global warming can really be checked.
This is precisely why one hopes that this book is read widely -- that Robinson's audience, already large, grows by an order of magnitude. Because the point of his books is to fire the imagination, to remind us that the great questions of our lives are not just about love and relationships, but also about politics and economics.
He ends with another set piece, this one charming. Mary Murphy, retired, has returned to Zurich after a dirigible tour of the planet, which has been increasingly rewilded as populations begin to shrink and human settlements are purposefully taken off the map. From the air the passengers have watched herds on the Serengeti, caribou streaming across a reviving Arctic. She has begun to fall for the gentle and quiet captain of the blimp, and the two of them now go out together to wander the streets of the Swiss city for Fasnacht, the pre-Lenten masquerade. Men with alphorns play Fanfare for the Common Man, a steel drum band offers a Trinidadian tune, some Andean Indians in serapes play the panpipes. Mary looks at this world, which she has done much to save, and she thinks:
That there is no other home for us than here. That we will cope no matter how stupid things get. That all couples are odd couples. That the only catastrophe that can't be undone is extinction. That we can make a good place. That people can take fate in their hands. That there is no such thing as fate.
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