Kim Stanley Robinson gives us an in depth look at the near future in a tale focused on dealing with the problem that is climate change in The Ministry for the Future. This book follows Mary Murphy who is in charge of a UN agency tasked with protecting the unborn future citizens of the world and called the Ministry of the Future. This is but one thread though it does weave through the entire book. It is joined by other threads and by single chapter vignettes all of which paint the story of the calamity & tragedy that await us in the coming decades. The story is lightened with the optimism of solution as Mary, in her work, and many of the vignettes, in their tales, speak of solutions.
All in all a powerful book that is quite hard to read and can at points leave you angry about where we are. It is important however to know where we are and to share the author’s optimism that hard work and radical change might (might) help us past it. Recommended.
