PERILS OF IMMORTALITY

In a future when people live longer by inputting their minds into artificial bodies, an insider in the trade meets a magnificent girl who tries to convince him she is a real human, not a replica.

Lloyd’s latest work of SF takes place in the same universe as his earlier novels, like A Place To Stay Forever (2019), but can be read as a stand-alone. The tale slyly relocates George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion to an SF setting. The year is 2792 in Cascadia, formerly Canada. Ever since the 21st century, technologies pioneered by legendary inventor/hero/godhead LaPorte have allowed elites to prolong their lives indefinitely via inserting their minds into cybernetic “husks” of varying sophistication. More than 700 years in his “LaPortan” exterior, narrator Harry Higgins, though not of the very first wave of would-be immortals, enjoys prestige as a top “carnationist,” creating custom husks of the utmost quality. But Higgins also suffers ennui in his advanced years, more so now since he is at a mental mortal limit (LaPortans could once recharge neurologically but lost the therapy in an ill-defined incident). He finds diversion in collecting techno-novelties. The latest: Kora, a beautiful girl sold to Higgins as a robot (illegally), installed in a deluxe husk. While Kora vainly tries to convince everyone that she's completely human—though she has no memory—Higgins accepts a bet with his friend Melbray that he can pass her off as a masterpiece of carnation at a big LaPortan social event. (By the way, Higgins has a niece named Eliza.) Other works that crossbreed classic material with fantastic fiction tend to either be silly mashups (Lynn Messina’s Little Vampire Women) or YA titles (Marissa Meyer’s Cinder). In this enjoyable story, Lloyd remains faithful to the voice and the sometimes insufferably smug brilliance of Shaw. This on occasion may make reading through Higgins’ thicket of storytelling an arduous expedition, as the material is (of course) verbose, obdurately intellectual, and often repetitious and hectoring. In addition, Higgins may well be an unreliable narrator (he claims chronic victimization by “Big Blue,” a talking bird that may or may not exist), and key elements of the setting go undeveloped. The author may provide more embellishments in future volumes of the series.

Cyberpunk meets George Bernard Shaw in this engaging SF tale.