五部不容錯過的反烏托邦小說

張曉敏

Article 5 by Kristen Simmons

In Simmons' debut2） novel， the United States has just experienced a time of massive unrest. The country is now run by the ultra-conservative Federal Bureau for Reformation. Protagonist3） Ember was born out of wedlock4） sixteen years ago when the US was the democracy we know. Now， her very existence is illegal， and she and her mother are arrested. With the help of her ex-boyfriend Chase， Ember needs to find a way to escape， break her mother out of federal prison， and find a place for them to live in a world that no longer makes sense. While there's not as much death in this novel as in The Hunger Games， there is more outright torture that we see happening directly on the page.

Uglies by Scott Westerfeld

Three hundred years from now， the world has entered a post-scarcity economy5）. Every sixteen-year-old is provided with plastic6） surgery as a marker of their coming of age. Tally is almost sixteen， and when her friend Shay runs away before her surgery， the government tasks Tally to find Shay in the rebel city of Smoke and to report the location to them. But when Tally finds Smoke， she discovers more than she bargained for7）， learning secrets the government would kill to protect. What really happens when one turns from an Ugly to a Pretty？

Across the Universe by Beth Revis

When seventeen-year-old Amy agreed to join her parents on a mission to colonize a new planet， she expected to be woken from a cryogenically8） frozen state planetside， ready to start building a new society. She didn't expect to be woken early by a boy named Elder， the future leader of the spaceship Godspeed. Life onboard hasn't been easy， and now Amy needs to help Elder re-shape a society where no one has choices while on board a spaceship that is falling apart around them.

Partials by Dan Wells

In the mid-twenty-first century， the human race is all but extinct after a war with Partials—genetically engineered organic beings identical9） to humans. The population has been reduced to only tens of thousands by RM， Partials' weaponized virus to which only a fraction of humanity is immune. The few survivors of the plague huddle10） together on Long Island， looting11） the ruins of the surrounding city for supplies. In the eleven years since the world collapsed， RM has killed every infant born to the survivors， who are still carriers of the disease. On the mainland， Partials are also beginning to die. Sixteen-year-old human Kira Walker is a medic in training， and she is desperate to cure RM. She hypothesizes12） that the Partials may hold a key to the cure and risks everything to see if she's right.

Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow

In a near-future Britain， the government is effectively controlled by media corporations. A teenager boy called Trent McCauley enjoys making his own films out of film clips he's downloaded from the internet. All of the films he uses are under copyright by someone else， and what he's doing is highly illegal. When his hobby causes the government to shut off the internet for his entire family， he runs away to London where he meets other teens just like himself. Living on the fringes and off the grid13）， Trent and his friends decide to take on the media giants to change the laws that have become too oppressive.

《第五條款》（克麗絲滕·西蒙斯著）

在西蒙斯的這部處女作中，美國剛剛經(jīng)歷了一段時期的大規(guī)模動蕩，政權(quán)現(xiàn)由極端保守的聯(lián)邦改革局掌控。主人公恩貝爾是私生女，出生于16年前，那時美國還是我們所了解的民主國家。而現(xiàn)在，恩貝爾的存在違反了法律，她和母親都被逮捕了。在前男友蔡斯的幫助下，恩貝爾需要想辦法逃跑，把母親救出聯(lián)邦監(jiān)獄，還得在這個不再有意義的世界里為自己和母親找個棲身之所。雖然這部小說中沒有《饑餓游戲》中那么多的死亡，但從字里行間我們卻能直接看到更多赤裸裸的折磨在發(fā)生。

《丑人兒》（司各特·韋斯特菲爾德著）

300年后，世界已經(jīng)步入了后稀缺經(jīng)濟時代。每個人到了16歲都要接受整形手術，這是成年的標志。塔利就快16歲了，她的朋友謝伊在手術前逃走了，于是政府派給塔利一項任務——去反叛之城煙城尋找謝伊，并向他們匯報她的位置。但當塔利找到煙城時，她的發(fā)現(xiàn)卻讓她很意外，知道了政府不惜殺人也要保守的秘密。當一個人由丑變美時究竟會發(fā)生什么呢？

《穿越蒼穹》（貝絲·雷維斯著）

當17歲的埃米同意與父母一起完成把新行星變殖民地的任務時，她預想著自己將在低溫冰凍狀態(tài)下的行星邊際被喚醒，準備開始建立一個新社會。沒想到她被一個名叫埃爾德的男孩提前喚醒，而埃爾德正是“神速”號宇宙飛船未來的領導者。宇宙飛船上的生活并不容易，現(xiàn)在埃米需要幫助埃爾德重新塑造一個社會，這里的人們在登上這艘即將毀滅的宇宙飛船時就已經(jīng)別無選擇。

《半人》（丹·韋爾斯著）

21世紀中葉，在經(jīng)歷了與“半人”（經(jīng)過基因改造的有機生命物種，和人類長得一模一樣）的一場戰(zhàn)爭后，人類幾乎滅絕。半人以一種名為RM的病毒為武器，使得人類數(shù)量銳減至數(shù)萬——因為僅有一小部分人對這種病毒具有免疫力。這些從瘟疫中幸存下來的極少數(shù)人在長島市扎堆，靠劫掠已淪為廢墟的周邊城市來尋求補給。在世界崩潰后的11年里，幸存者們依然是該疾病的攜帶者，RM奪走了他們生下的所有新生兒的生命。在美國本土，半人們也開始相繼死亡。16歲的正常人吉拉·沃克是個見習醫(yī)生，她迫切希望找到治療RM的方法。吉拉猜想半人可能持有治療RM的關鍵要素，于是不顧一切地想證明自己的想法是否正確。

《盜版電影院》（科里·多克托羅著）

在不久的將來，英國政府實質(zhì)上由媒體集團控制。一個名叫特倫特·麥康利的少年喜歡用他從網(wǎng)上下載的電影片段制作自己的電影。他使用的所有電影都有版權(quán)，所以他所做的事情是嚴重違法的。當特倫特·麥考利的這一愛好招致政府切斷他們?nèi)业木W(wǎng)絡連接時，他逃到了倫敦，在那里遇到了與他有相似遭遇的其他少年。生活在市郊又遠離公共設施，特倫特和他的朋友們決定對抗媒體巨頭，改變已變得過于嚴苛的法律。

1. dystopian [d?s?t??pi?n] adj. 反面假想國的，反面烏托邦的

2. debut [?de?bju?] adj. 首次露面的

3. protagonist [pr??t?ɡ?n?st] n. （戲劇、小說或真實事件里的）主人公

4. born out of wedlock： 非婚生的。wedlock [?wedl?k] n. [舊]婚姻

5. a post-scarcity economy： 后稀缺經(jīng)濟社會，是一種理論設想，在這種社會里，商品、服務、資訊都大量存在，可以被人們無償占有，貨幣也將不復存在。

6. plastic [?pl?st?k] adj. 【醫(yī)】整形的

7. bargain for： [通常與否定詞或more than連用]預料；指望

8. cryogenically [?kra???d?en?k?li] adv. 低溫地

9. identical [a??dent?kl] adj. 完全相同的

10. huddle [?h?dl] vi. 擠在一起

11. loot [lu?t] vt. （戰(zhàn)爭或暴亂時）搶劫（商店或房屋）

12. hypothesize [ha??p?θ?sa?z] vt. 猜測；假定

13. off the grid： 與公共設施斷開連接