The Fortunate Fall

By: Cameron Reed, Jo Walton - introduction

Narrated by: Frankie Corzo

A debut novel of remarkable beauty and invention, The Fortunate Fall is back for the first time in almost three decades as a Tor Essential, with a new introduction by Jo Walton.

Tor Essentials presents new editions of science fiction and fantasy titles of proven merit and lasting value, each volume introduced by an appropriate literary figure.

On its first publication in 1996, The Fortunate Fall was hailed as a sci-fi novel of a wired future on par with the debuts of William Gibson and Neal Stephenson. Now it returns, in advance of forthcoming new work by the same author. It is one of the great underground classics of the last several decades in science fiction.

Maya Andreyeva is a camera, a reporter with virtual-reality-broadcasting equipment implanted in her brain. What sh esees, millions see; what she feels, millions share.

And what Maya is seeing is the cover-up of a massacre. As she probes into the covert political power plays of a radically strange near-future Russia, she comes upon secrets that have been hidden from the world… and memories that AI-controlled thought police have forced her to hide from herself. Because in a world where no thought or desire is safe, the price of survival is betrayal—of your lover, your ideals, and yourself.

This new Tor Essentials edition of The Fortunate Fall includes a new introduction by Jo Walton, winner of the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Awards.

©2024 Cameron Reed and Jo Walton (P)2024 Dreamscape Lore

Way ahead of its writing

For having been written in 1997, it was/is way ahead of its time of writing. We haven't gotten to internet implants yet, but there is a lot of ideas that are very contemporary (I just read about the first implant possibility a few days ago). The love story (not precisely a live story) fits nicely into the plot, and the various political/social powers fits nicely into today’s world where leaders pretend to be doing good for their people, when they are really doing good only for themselves. The best old/new novelbI have read in the past couple of years, that has existed way before…time traveling…

Was not a fan

I’m a huge fan of the Cyberpunk genre and I was very interested in the idea of cameras and screeners. This part is done very well. They do a good job with cybernetics and explaining how it works. The story is very strange and becomes hard to follow at the end. The build up of finding out info on the era from long ago got me excited for a lackluster ending with the main character. It wasn’t good, but it wasn’t unbearable.