Click image for free sample. What is "life" like in the cubicle of the near-future?
What if you were not exactly fully "alive," but merely existing?
What if you were permitted only 59 minutes once each year to communicate online with your mother and father?
Check out "Family Hour" the first of the "3rd Era Short Stories," now available in numerous formats on Smashwords:
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/337852
Fans of my "STARLING Series," will be happy to know this new series of short tales, "The 3rd Era Stories," is set in a similar kind of dystopia, with a few key differences.
The "3rd Era" dystopia is a bit more extreme in that human beings NEVER walk and are relegated to exist all their days within cubicles, never seeing the sun or feeling the outside air.
These cubicles are just large enough to fit a Body Mobility Device (BMD) which maneuvers the "Valued Associates" among the screen walls of the cubicle.
Those existing within the cubicles don't have names, only numbers, and are constantly watched by "Supervisors," nominally artificially intelligent robots which work for the Board of Directors of Global Corporation, the powerful entity which has herded humanity into these massive cubicle complexes.
There is a larger story to be told here of the "3rd Era," which I've sketched out in full today. I'm excited about how this series will develop, and have some new ideas I want to flesh out. Not to give anything away, but think Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey," one of my favorite science fiction films.
Hope you'll check this new story out and be looking forward to more "3rd Era Stories" stemming from "Family Hour," short tales which will answer the question of whether or not a human being is able to escape from the cubicle and what he will find outside the walls of the complex and beyond.
Here's the description of "Family Hour" via Smashwords:
What if you were not exactly fully "alive," but merely existing?
What if you were permitted only 59 minutes once each year to communicate online with your mother and father?
Check out "Family Hour" the first of the "3rd Era Short Stories," now available in numerous formats on Smashwords:
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/337852
Fans of my "STARLING Series," will be happy to know this new series of short tales, "The 3rd Era Stories," is set in a similar kind of dystopia, with a few key differences.
The "3rd Era" dystopia is a bit more extreme in that human beings NEVER walk and are relegated to exist all their days within cubicles, never seeing the sun or feeling the outside air.
These cubicles are just large enough to fit a Body Mobility Device (BMD) which maneuvers the "Valued Associates" among the screen walls of the cubicle.
Those existing within the cubicles don't have names, only numbers, and are constantly watched by "Supervisors," nominally artificially intelligent robots which work for the Board of Directors of Global Corporation, the powerful entity which has herded humanity into these massive cubicle complexes.
There is a larger story to be told here of the "3rd Era," which I've sketched out in full today. I'm excited about how this series will develop, and have some new ideas I want to flesh out. Not to give anything away, but think Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey," one of my favorite science fiction films.
Hope you'll check this new story out and be looking forward to more "3rd Era Stories" stemming from "Family Hour," short tales which will answer the question of whether or not a human being is able to escape from the cubicle and what he will find outside the walls of the complex and beyond.
Here's the description of "Family Hour" via Smashwords:
In the near future, known as the "3rd Era," most human beings have been reduced to "Valued Associates," Global Corporation's word for people whose brains are completely connected within massive cubicle complexes. Echo 900682972187 "lives" all his days within the narrow walls of his Multitasking Cubicle-Home Station (MCHS). Every aspect of his existence is completely focused on "Productivity," also known as the bridge to Global Corporation's promised utopia, the mythical "7th Era." Once per year (12-Month Productivity Cycle), Valued Associates are scheduled exactly 59 minutes to communicate with their biological parents. Welcome to "Family Hour."
Again, "Family Hour" is hot off the shelf and available via Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/337852
