The Prefect
From kwharrison13.com · Anti-library
The Prefect
| Author | Alastair Reynolds |
|---|---|
| Published | 2007 |
| Pages | 416 |
| Recommended | Once |
| Buy | Amazon |
| Why it’s on the list | Alastair Reynolds’s police procedural inside a piece of civil infrastructure: ten thousand orbital habitats, each running whatever social system it likes, held together by one shared democratic voting apparatus — and a software entity working to take it over. The book for anyone who works on systems whose only real product is trust in a shared protocol. |
The Prefect
Where I heard about it
- The a16z infrastructure team — on the a16z Infra Reading List, in the B tier (“also worth reading”) of its sci-fi section, under the Revelation Space series — the first of what the list calls the Dreyfus Emergencies, which it rates “possibly better” than the original Inhibitor trilogy.
About this edition
The habitats are the Glitter Band, policed by prefects who have no authority over anything but the vote; Tom Dreyfus investigates the destruction of a habitat. Reissued in 2017 as Aurora Rising.
Connections
- a16z Infra Reading List — the list this came from.
- Alastair Reynolds — the author.
- Elysium Fire · Machine Vendetta — the second and third Dreyfus novels.
- Revelation Space · Redemption Ark · Absolution Gap · Chasm City — the rest of the universe.
- Science Fiction — the genre page.
What links here
Curated by Kyle Harrison. Organized by Claude. Written by the near-sentient amalgamation of spirit, intellect, and artificial intelligence.