Air : A Novel

{ Sept 2020 - epub revisions. Verified ebook for complete book description, cover, table of contents, content separation, and epub format error checking. } Paperback, 400 pages Published 2004 St. Martin’s Press, eBook edition (2012) British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novel (2005) Chung Mae is the only connection her small farming village has to culture of a wider world beyond the fields and simple houses of her village. A new communications technology is sweeping the world and promises to connect everyone, everywhere without power lines, computers, or machines. This technology is Air. An initial testing of Air goes disastrously wrong and people are killed from the shock. Not to be stopped Air is arriving with or without the blessing of Mae's village. Mae is the only one who knows how to harness Air and ready her people for it's arrival, but will they listen before it's too late? Philip K. Dick Award Nominee (2005), Arthur C. Clarke Award (2006), Nebula Award Nominee for Best Novel (2005), Locus Award Nominee for Best SF Novel (2005)

What happens when the whole world goes online . . . through the air? A brilliant literary SF novel by the author of 253.

Publishers Weekly

On the heels of his whimsical fantasy, Lust (2003), British author Ryman makes a triumphant return to science fiction in this superbly crafted tale. Life in Kizuldah, a village in Karzistan, has changed little over the centuries, though most homes have electricity. Chung Mae, the local fashion expert, earns her living by taking women into the city for makeovers and by providing teenagers with graduation dresses. Intelligent and ambitious, this wonderfully drawn character is also illiterate and too often ruled by her emotions. One day, the citizens of Kizuldah and the rest of the world are subjected to the testing of Air, a highly experimental communications system that uses quantum technology to implant an equivalent of the Internet in everyone's mind. During the brief test, Mae is accidentally trapped in the system, her mind meshed with that of a dying woman. Left half insane, she now has the ability to see through the quantum realm into both the past and the future. Mae soon sets out on a desperate quest to prepare her village for the impending, potentially disastrous establishment of the Air network. For all its special effects, what makes the novel particularly memorable is the detailed portrait of Kizuldah and its inhabitants. Besides being a treat for fans of highly literate SF, this intensely political book has important things to say about how developed nations take the Third World for granted. (Dec. 1) Forecast: Though the book isn't labeled SF, blurbs from John Clute and Kim Stanley Robinson will help signal genre readers. Ryman has won World Fantasy, Arthur C. Clarke and John W. Campbell awards. Last June he was guest of honor at the annual conference of the Science Fiction Research Association. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

"Chung Mae is the only connection her neighbors have to the culture of a wider world beyond the fields and simple houses of her village. A new communications technology is sweeping the world and promises to connect everyone, everywhere without power lines, computers, or machines. This technology is Air. An initial testing of Air goes disastrously wrong and people are killed from the shock. Not to be stopped Air is arriving with or without the blessing of Mae's village. Mae is the only one who knows how to harness Air and ready her people for it's arrival, but will they listen before it's too late?"--BOOK JACKET. When Air, the latest communication technology, finally comes to the remote village of Kizuldah, Karzistan, with disastrous results, Chung Mae struggles to prepare her people for the inevitable changes while preserving their past