''Termination Shock'' is a
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...
novel by American writer
Neal Stephenson
Neal Town Stephenson (born October 31, 1959) is an American writer known for his works of speculative fiction. His novels have been categorized as science fiction, historical fiction, cyberpunk, postcyberpunk, and baroque.
Stephenson's work exp ...
, published in 2021. The book is set in a near-future Earth where climate change has significantly altered human society, and follows the attempts of a
solar geoengineering scheme. The novel focuses on the geopolitical and social consequences of the rogue fix for climate change, themes common in the growing
climate fiction
Climate fiction (sometimes shortened as cli-fi) is literature that deals with climate change.Glass, Rodge (31 May 2013).Global Warning: The Rise of 'Cli-fi' retrieved 3 March 2016 Generally speculative in nature but scientifically-grounded, wor ...
genre.
Plot
The book is about a
solar geoengineering project conceived by a Texas oil-industry billionaire named T.R. Schmidt. Schmidt builds a launcher on the Texas-Mexico border to fire
sulfur
Sulfur (or sulphur in British English) is a chemical element with the symbol S and atomic number 16. It is abundant, multivalent and nonmetallic. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with a chemical formula ...
into the air, a form of
stratospheric aerosol injection
Stratospheric aerosol injection is a proposed method of solar geoengineering (or solar radiation modification) to reduce global warming. This would introduce aerosols into the stratosphere to create a cooling effect via global dimming and increa ...
intended to cool the planet by reflecting sunlight into space.
This technique replicates the effects of volcanic eruptions that inject sulfates into the atmosphere and produce global cooling, such as the 1991
Mount Pinatubo eruption.
Schmidt's plan has uneven effects, helping low-lying areas such as the
Netherlands
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,
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
, and the
Maldives
Maldives (, ; dv, ދިވެހިރާއްޖެ, translit=Dhivehi Raajje, ), officially the Republic of Maldives ( dv, ދިވެހިރާއްޖޭގެ ޖުމްހޫރިއްޔާ, translit=Dhivehi Raajjeyge Jumhooriyyaa, label=none, ), is an archipelag ...
, but threatening the
Punjab
Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...
with drought.
The main characters are Frederika Mathilde Louisa Saskia, the
Queen of the Netherlands
The monarchy of the Netherlands is a constitutional monarchy. As such, the role and position of the monarch are governed by the Constitution of the Netherlands. Consequently, a large portion of it is devoted to the monarch. Roughly a third of ...
, and granddaughter of
Queen Beatrix; Rufus Grant, a part-
Comanche
The Comanche or Nʉmʉnʉʉ ( com, Nʉmʉnʉʉ, "the people") are a Native American tribe from the Southern Plains of the present-day United States. Comanche people today belong to the federally recognized Comanche Nation, headquartered in La ...
exterminator of
feral hogs; and Deep "Laks" Singh, a
Punjab-Canadian Sikh
Sikhs ( or ; pa, ਸਿੱਖ, ' ) are people who adhere to Sikhism, Sikhism (Sikhi), a Monotheism, monotheistic religion that originated in the late 15th century in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent, based on the revelation of Gu ...
.
Saskia and Grant become entangled in Schmidt's plan, while Singh travels to the
Line of Actual Control on the China-India border, where Chinese and Indian volunteers fight each other using non-lethal martial arts. Singh becomes a world-famous hero after several dramatic and well-promoted victories, but is felled by Chinese
directed-energy weapons.
Meanwhile, the Chinese government observes Schmidt's geoengineering efforts, and engages in advanced
psychological warfare
Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PsyOp), have been known by many other names or terms, including Military Information Support Operations (MISO), Psy Ops, political warfare, "Hearts and Mi ...
,
cyberwarfare
Cyberwarfare is the use of cyber attacks against an enemy state, causing comparable harm to actual warfare and/or disrupting vital computer systems. Some intended outcomes could be espionage, sabotage, propaganda, manipulation or economic war ...
, and deadly
tsunami bombs to shift European governments towards a pro-geoengineering stance. This also results in Saskia
abdicating her throne for her daughter, after which she joins the growing consortium of smaller pro-geoengineering nations as the "Queen of the Netherworld."
In the climax of the book, Singh is sent with a team of
drones on a covert mission by India, whose monsoons were delayed by Schmidt's geoengineering campaign, to destroy the Texas launcher. He is thwarted by Rufus, who takes action largely to protect Saskia, who is hiding in the launcher's subterranean shaft.
The book's title refers to the idea that once a solar geoengineering scheme begins, abruptly stopping it would result in rapid warming, called a
termination shock
The heliosphere is the magnetosphere, astrosphere and outermost atmospheric layer of the Sun. It takes the shape of a vast, bubble-like region of space. In plasma physics terms, it is the cavity formed by the Sun in the surrounding interstell ...
.
Reception
Omar El Akkad
Omar El Akkad (born 1982) is an Egyptian-Canadian novelist and journalist, whose novel ''What Strange Paradise'' was the winner of the 2021 Giller Prize.
Early life and education
Omar El Akkad was born in Cairo, Egypt, and grew up in Doha, Qat ...
, reviewing ''Termination Shock'' for ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', wrote that it was "...at once wildly imaginative and grounded...both a response to a deeply broken reality, and an attempt to alter it."
''
Reason
Reason is the capacity of consciously applying logic by drawing conclusions from new or existing information, with the aim of seeking the truth. It is closely associated with such characteristically human activities as philosophy, science, ...
'' magazine noted that the book concerns many small-scale adaptations to climate change, and interpreted it as, "...a novelistic attempt to break down the challenges of climate change and address them clearly and concretely rather than as a mass of unsolvable civilizational mega-challenges."
The ''
Chicago Review of Books
The ''Chicago Review of Books'' is an online literary publication of StoryStudio Chicago which reviews recent books covering diverse genres, presses, voices, and media. The magazine was started in 2016 and Adam Morgan is the founding editor-in-c ...
'' found it to be a "compelling read" but "only obliquely an example of Stephenson’s great gifts for speculative fiction",
while ''
Publishers Weekly
''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of B ...
'' called it, "fiercely intelligent, weird, darkly witty, and boldly speculative." ''
The Sunday Times
''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...
'' reviewed it negatively, saying that, "Stephenson’s vision of our climate future doesn’t rise above the level of slightly smug, nerdy fun."
Francis Fukuyama compared it favorably to a 2020 work of climate fiction, ''
The Ministry for the Future
''The Ministry for the Future'' is a climate fiction ("cli-fi") novel by American science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson published in 2020. Set in the near future, the novel follows a subsidiary body, established under the Paris Agreement, ...
'' by
Kim Stanley Robinson
Kim Stanley Robinson (born March 23, 1952) is an American writer of science fiction. He has published twenty-two novels and numerous short stories and is best known for his ''Mars'' trilogy. His work has been translated into 24 languages. Many ...
.
References
External links
''Termination Shock'' Bibliography
{{Authority control
2021 American novels
Climate change novels
Novels by Neal Stephenson
HarperCollins books