''2030: The Real Story of What Happens to America'' is the first novel written by American actor and comedian Albert Brooks.

Synopsis

The story follows a diverse cast of characters in the year 2030, by which (hypothetical) time *

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will have been cured * generational tension between the young and the old will have escalated, and * a "half-Jewish" president of the United States will have been elected (hamstrung by massive

federal debt A country's gross government debt (also called public debt, or sovereign debt) is the financial liabilities of the government sector. Changes in government debt over time reflect primarily borrowing due to past government deficits. A deficit oc ...

) and will also be challenged by: ::*a high-profile kidnapping of senior citizens ::*massive reconstruction of earthquake-devastated

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in partnership with China, and ::*a constitutional amendment which could lead to a foreign-born president.

Development

According to Brooks, he "did an earlier version of the book as a

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" but felt it would be too expensive to produce it as a futuristic film. The novel "is meant to be very plausible ..I almost wanted the book to read like a news story. This is not a faraway America." Brooks had already written "substantial portions of ''2030''" before pitching it to Elizabeth Beier, Brooks’s editor at St. Martin’s Press.

Reception

The book received mostly positive reviews. Janet Maslin of ''

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 d ...

'' remarked that Brooks "made the nervy move of transposing his worrywart sensibility from film to book. Two things are immediately apparent about his debut novel: that it’s as purposeful as it is funny, and that Mr. Brooks has immersed himself deeply in its creation." Asking why Brooks' take should be taken seriously, Maslin answers, "his prognostications are not so farfetched for futuristic fiction; that he has worked them into a real novel, not a tricked-up movie treatment; and that a little humor goes a long way in this often bleak genre". But about the ending, "some events seem abrupt and artificial", and Brooks "doesn’t have the pitilessness it requires." '' Kirkus Reviews'' summarized, "Actor Albert Brooks has fun imagining a world in the future—though not too far in the future to be wholly implausible" and "the tone is satiric, something Brooks usually does with a light touch, though occasionally he loses the playfulness and shows too heavy a hand." ''

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 ...

'' called the novel a "smart and surprisingly serious debut", noted its "sweeping narrative", and classified it as "a novel as entertaining as it is thought provoking, like something from the imagination of a

borscht belt The Borscht Belt, or Jewish Alps, is a colloquial term for the mostly defunct summer resorts of the Catskill Mountains in parts of Sullivan, Orange, and Ulster counties in the U.S. state of New York, straddling both Upstate New York and the nort ...

H.G. Wells."

References

External links

''2030''
St Martin's Press page
Albert Brooks
page {{DEFAULTSORT:2030 (novel) 2011 American novels Dystopian novels American comedy novels Fiction set in 2030 Novels set in the 2030s Works by Albert Brooks 2011 debut novels St. Martin's Press books