Futures Near and Far

The Red: First Light by Linda Nagata

KMO speaks with hard SF novelist and publisher, Linda Nagata.  A listener sent KMO a copy of Linda's first novel, The Bohr Maker, and in preparing for the interview he immersed himself in some of her more recent work including the short stories Nightside on Callisto and Through Your Eyes as well as the related novel, The Red: First Light. The soldiers in her novel wear powered exoskeletons which are more advanced versions of systems actually in development by Lockheed Martin (video). Linda describes the inspiration for her excursion into military science fiction which includes concern for eroding civil liberties and the growing power of defense contractors. The conversation also touches on the diminishing expectations for molecular nanotechnology.

 

Music by Mass Spectrometer.