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The Sheep Look Up

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The Sheep Look Up

By: John Brunner
Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
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In a near future, the air pollution is so bad that everyone wears gas masks. The infant mortality rate is soaring, and birth defects, new diseases, and physical ailments of all kinds abound. The water is undrinkable - unless you're poor and have no choice. Large corporations fighting over profits from gas masks, drinking water, and clean food tower over an ineffectual, corrupt government.

Environmentalist Austin Train is on the run. The "trainites", a group of violent environmental activists, want him to lead their movement; the government wants him dead; and the media demands amusement. But Train just wants to survive.

More than a novel of science fiction, The Sheep Look Up is a skillful and frightening political and social commentary that takes its place next to other remarkable works of dystopian literature, such as Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, and George Orwell's 1984.

©2014 John Brunner (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc., and Skyboat Media, Inc. Adventure Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic Science Fiction Fiction Government Apocalyptic Fiction
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Stunningly prescient. A Silent Spring for the 70s. Take this as a terrible warning. You don't need a weatherman.

First time I read this for 40 years

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Published in 1972, The Sheep Look Up is set in the United States and deals with a toxic environment of disease, deprivation, racism, drugs and insanity and a president who should be locked up. With me so far? John Brunner is best known for Stand on Zanzibar. That's a fine novel but this actually feels like his masterpiece.

So prophetic it made me cringe (in a good way)

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You can read it as a time peace. Yep this was the world in 1970. Looking to the future where everything has gone to ****. It is right on the Money.
The black/white thing is nicely handled but dated. JB obviously knew a lot about 70s racism.

It is about a world destroyed by human greed. It makes hypotheses on what will happen if things continue and most have come true.
Train the lead character comes across like Joan of Arc. A 20th century leader, whose voice is not welcomed by those in charge.

Depressing.

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I found this book exhausting, for two main reasons. Firstly, the content. This is a straight "what if" of what our world would look like if the environmental campaigns of the 60's-90's had not succeeded. If you have any kind of background in environmental sciences or are aware of current environmental challenges, it's very depressing. Secondly, the book jumps around between the actual story (which is woven together from a number of different stories) and excerpts from various forms of media. The narration doesn't make the transitions obvious, which makes the book hard to follow in places.
I am still glad I read it because it's a classic, and I guess it might entertain those for whom it's not all too realistic. But I am glad to have finished it, and I look forward to never reading it again.

Exhausting and poorly converted to audio format

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In the 51 years since publication, so much of this book has come to pass. We haven’t fixed the social and environmental issues Brunner was then aware of, and we’ve added a few more of our own since. The prose shows its age for certain, but the multiple story arc structure is surprisingly contemporary, as are the frequent and abrupt closures of some character’s stories. I’d consider using this as a set-text for school students, instead of the usual 1984/Brave New World combination.

Can’t get over the prescience

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