Lagrange five Book

The concept is truly, honestly interesting, but the 1970s veil of racism and sexism was difficult to peek out from behind and see the vision of the book Reynolds was actually trying to write.

First of all the only female character, Susie Hawkins, is a doctor, but I'd forgotten that by the middle of the book because it's only mentioned maybe 2 times and also because she is a secretary. A damn secretary. I had to check to make sure this book wasn't written in the 1940s, which would have made more sense. There is also one black character in the story, Whip Ford, and you absolutely know he is black, because Reynolds spends the entire book referring to him as "the Black." Ford also hates white people and calls them all "whitey" because he resents the subjugation that his race suffered for centuries, but as both Reynolds and the main character point out, racism doesn't exist anymore and it's all in black people's heads.

I hereby nominate Mack Reynolds for the honor of the Nobel Peace Prize for tremendous service to his fellow man in completely ridding the world of racism.

Ford's solution to the inequality is to segregate the black race from the rest of the world, thereby creating their own space colony called the Promised Land Society. At the end of the book, this is supposed to be treated as a viable solution and a happy ending. See? Black people and white people don't hate each other- we can just never ever get along! The weirdest part was digesting the book's theme of the myth of racism, all while it wallows in Reynolds' obvious hate or at least distrust of "the Arabs." There are no good Middle Easterners in this book. They are the schemers, the crooked politicians, the users of crude violence. Both Reynolds and the main character refer to them frequently as oily, snake-like and beak-nosed. They are wily enough to conspire to overthrow a government, but they'll beg for mercy when they're thwarted because ultimately, they are cowards. Even if I attempted to take Reynolds' antiracism theme seriously, I can't. He destroys his own point more eloquently than I ever could.

Also the main story of the book involves the idea that modern technology and medicine allow everyone to thrive, not only the most physically and intellectually fit and that is...a bad thing? No more are the days when a kid with a peanut allergy wouldn't make it past toddlerhood. Those damn epipens are everywhere, spitting in the face of our holy and devout Charles Darwin! So the solution and ultimate moral of the book is to separate all of societies best specimens (IQ over 130, peak physical and mental condition,..) on a utopian space colony and leave all the rest with undesirable traits to rot on a decaying earth. Like I know this book was written almost 50 years ago but I feel like the message still shouldn't be...YAY EUGENICS! And the very last pages of the book are wasted building up that idea so...yay eugenics..? I guess? I don't know it's a weird book.