"Angel of Light" - Joe [Joseph William] Haldeman (b. 1943) (Cosmos A Magazine of Ideas, Science, Society and the Future (Strawberry Hills, NSW, Australia), 2005)
The background to a humorous Christmas story is a mildly dystopian future dominated by Islam.
Rpt. in The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Third Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner [Raymond] Dozois (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2006), 571-77; and The Year’s Best SF 11. Ed. David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer (New York: Eos, 2006), 425-34.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Anywhere But Here - Jerry [Brian] Oltion (b. 1957) (Tor, 2005)
Humorous dystopia where the U.S. government, already dominating the Earth, tries to dominate those settling outer space. It ultimately fails.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Atomik Aztex - Sesshu Foster (b. 1957) (City Lights, 2005)
Dystopia in which Aztecs rule the Americas and are colonizing Europe. One of the protagonists has nightmares about American consumerism, and lives through a real nightmare working in a meatpacking plant reminiscent of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle.
Parts were published in different form as “Atomik Aztex.” Amerasia Journal 27.2 (2001): 145-66, in the L.A. Weekly, and on Salon.com.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Black Arrow: A Tale of Resistance - Vin Suprynowicz (b. 1950) (Mountain Media, 2005)
Dystopia from a libertarian perspective and the struggle against it.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Book of Summer - James F. David (Tor, 2005)
Dystopia in sequel to his 2005 Judgment Day. In this volume, an Earth colony called Planet America has reestablished slavery.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil - George Saunders (b. 1958) (Riverhead Books, 2005)
Satire and humor. Inner Horner can only hold one citizen at a time. Outer Horner, under its leader Phil, tries to collect taxes from those waiting to enter Inner Horner and starts a conflict.
U.K. ed. "The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil." In his The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil and In Persuasion Nation (London Bloomsbury, 2006), 1-92.
Keywords: Male author; US author

A Brother's Price - [Wendy] [Kosak] (b. 1963) (Roc, 2005)
Dystopia with a happy ending. Future where few males are born and the difficulty of true love when each male must marry many women.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Building Harlequin's Moon - Larry [Lawrence van Cott] Niven (b. 1938); Brenda Cooper (b. 1951) (Tor, 2005)
Authoritarian dystopia and the successful struggle against it.
Keywords: Female author; Male author; US author

Burn - James Patrick Kelly (b. 1951) (Tachyon Publications, 2005)
Flawed utopia. A planet is renamed Walden and intends to follow Henry David Thoreau's (1817-62) practice of voluntary simplicity. The founder of the experiment is somewhat authoritarian, and the previous inhabitants fight against the new settlers using fire.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Calorie Man" - Paolo [Tadini] Bacigalupi (b. 1972) (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2005)
Dystopia. Corporate control of most agricultural products, and the corporations rule the world through their control over the food supply. The story focuses on an attempt to help a geneticist spread free seeds. 2006 "Yellow Card Man" and 2009 Bacigalupi are set in the same future.
Rpt. in The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Third Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner [Raymond] Dozois (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2006), 32-54; in Rewired: The Post-Cyberpunk Anthology. Ed. James P. Kelley and John Kessel (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2007), 337-66; and  Bacigalupi’s Pump Six and Other Stories (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2008), 93-121.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Counting Heads - David Marusek (b. 1951) (Tor, 2005)
Flawed utopia. Overpopulated future earth which easily produces more than enough for everyone, but the ease of production has eliminated all but a few jobs. There is a planned reduction in population. See also 1999 and 2009 Marusek.
The first section, "We Were Out of Our Minds With Joy" (9-46) is revised from a novella of the same title originally published in Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine 19.12& 13 (237& 38) (November 1995): 48-54, 56-58, 60-97. Rpt. in his Getting to Know You (Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2007), 111-80.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Coyote Frontier: A Novel of Interstellar Exploration - Allen M[ulherin] Steele [Jr.] (b. 1958) (Ace Books, 2005)
Final volume of a trilogy. See 2002 and 2004 Steele. In this volume, while Coyote won its freedom from Earth, its infrastructure has deteriorated and requires costly replacement. Earth, meanwhile, is in ruins, and Coyote is the best available planet for its population. Conflicts develop among the people of Coyote and with the people from Earth. His Spindrift. New York: Ace Books, 2007. U.K. ed. London: Orbit, 2007 is a first contact novel that uses the setting of the Coyote novels, and his Galaxy Blues. New York: Ace Books, 2008 is set in the same universe. Three novels that relate to and continue aspects of Coyote history are Coyote Horizon: A Novel of Interstellar Discovery. New York: Ace Books, 2009; part originally published as “Walking Star.” Forbidden Planets. Ed. Marvin Kaye (New York: Science Fiction Book Club, 2006), 49-98; Coyote Destiny: A Novel of Interstellar Discovery. New York: Ace Books, 2010.; and Hex. New York: Ace Books, 2011.  A related story that is set after the events of this novel is “Barren Isle.” Asimov’s Science Fiction (January-February 2018): 132-48.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The crime of the century: A little family planning" - Geoff Brumfiel (Nature, 2005)
Dystopia. To have a child someone in the family must die.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Daughters of an Emerald Dusk - Katherine [V.] Forrest (b. 1939) (Alyson Books, 2005)
Sequel to 1984 and 2002 Forrest. In this novel the women from Earth and the new planet get back together on the new planet. But those born on the new planet become more and more adapted to it and separated from their mothers. At the end of this novel, most of the women born on Earth, return to it.
Keywords: Canadian author; US author

"A Digital Day" - Jan [Johannes] Amkreutz (Moving Along: Far Ahead. Volume Four of Tackling Tomorrow Today, 2005)
Technological eutopia.
Keywords: Dutch author; Male author; US author

"Disposable Children" - M[arcia] Lynx Qualey (Lenox Avenue, 2005)
Just what it says. Purchase a kit at your genetics superstore, give birth in six days, and have the child grow from birth to teen in nineteen weeks, at which point they die.
Keywords: Egyptian author; Female author; US author

Doctor Salt - Gerard Donovan (b. 1959) (Scribner, 2005)
Dystopia of corporate medicine.
Keywords: Irish author; Male author; US author

Dr. Warpenstein: The Invisible Foe - Beaver, Bennie M (Xlibris, 2005)
Projected dystopia that fails to achieve its ends, which includes control of all humanity.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Echo" - Elizabeth [Francis] Hand (b. 1957) (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, 2005)
Dystopia of a collapsing civilization. The dystopia is mostly in the background with the suggestion of successful terrorist attacks.
Rpt. in her Saffron and Brimstone: Strange Stories. A Collection (Milwaukee, WI: M Books, 2006), 208-18; and in Otherworldly Maine. Ed. Noreen Doyle (Camden, ME: Down East, 2008), 90-98.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"The Emperor" - Lucius [Taylor] Shepard (1943-2014) (Scifiction, 2005)
Dystopia. Corporate destruction of the environment.
Rpt. in his Viator Plus (Hornsea, Eng.: PS Publishing, 2009), 3-63.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Empire of Texas and The Star of India - Rodger Olsen (Great Authors Online and Rodger Olsen, 2005)
Post-catastrophe dystopia. Various environmental and political problems are not dealt with adequately and the U.S. collapses. Texas is poor, violent, and without education but develops into a workable empire. It is attacked by Brazil but wins and is on the road back to technological rebirth. Generally conservative viewpoint.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Fevreblau. A Novel - Kenneth Mark Hoover (b. 1959) (Five Star, 2005)
Dystopia set in Russia and its satellites in space but with a somewhat positive ending. The fevreblau was a disease the killed most of the women. A revolution against the Russian state leads initially to a continuing dystopia with various struggles among competing groups, but at the end hope is held out that positive change is beginning to take place.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Girls and Boys, Come Out to Play" - Michael [Jürgen] Swanwick (b. 1950) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2005)
Humorous eutopia. A future recreated Arcadia with nymphs and satyrs.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Goodness Gene - Sonia Levitin (b. 1934) (Dutton Books, 2005)
Young adult dystopia concerned with genetic engineering and cloning.
Keywords: Female author; German author; US author

"Gypsy Tail Wind" - Mary Rosenblum (1952-2018) (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2005)
Dystopias as background. One is a future extremely strict Singapore. A gypsy community has suggestions of eutopia about it. Said to be set in the same future as her Eternity Shift (Not published under that title). See also her “Green Shift.” Asimov’s Science Fiction 29.3 (350) (March 2005): 108-30, which is set in the same future.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Hammered - [Sarah Bear Elizabeth] [Wishnevsky] (b. 1971) (Bantam Books, 2005)
Authoritarian, violent dystopia set in 2062 with the world's ecosystem collapsing. Non-utopian sequels are Scardown. New York: Bantam Books, 2005; and Worldwired. New York: Bantam Books, 2005.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Ice Cream Doors" - Alan R. Barclay (On Spec: The Canadian Magazine of the Fantastic, 2005)
Alternative history authoritarian dystopia with deep rich/poor division.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Ivory Tower: A Place to call your own" - [Michael] Bruce Sterling (b. 1954) (Nature 434.7034, 2005)
Technological eutopia.
Rpt. without the subtitle or the illus. in Futures from Nature. Ed. Henry Gee (New York: Tor, 2007), 274-77.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Judgment Day - James F. David (Forge, 2005)
Armageddon (See Revelation 16) and the coming of the Antichrist with the remnant of the faithful escaping to another planet. See also 2005 David, The Book of Summer.
Rpt. New York: Tor, 2007.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Labor Day" - Patrick Tucker (Beacons of Tomorrow: First Collection, 2005)
Dystopia set in an ever-growing shopping mall in which people live permanently purchasing and immediately discarding goods.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Last Light. aRESTORATIONovel. Book One - Terri Blackstock (b. 1957) (Zonderavan, 2005)
First volume of a Christian dystopian series in which God takes way all electricity. Followed by Night Light. aRESTORATIONovel. Book Two. Grand Rapids, MI: Zonderavan, 2006; True Light aRESTORATIONovel. Book Three. Grand Rapids, MI: Zonderavan, 2007; and Dawn’s Light aRESTORATIONovel. Book Four. Grand Rapids, MI: Zonderavan, 2008. The series follows the experiences of various people, some of whom trust in God, who restores power at the end.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"The Lone and Level Sands" - L[ester] Neil Smith [III] (1946-2021) (Future Washington, 2005)
Libertarian eutopia.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"A Modest Proposal ... for the Perfection of Nature" - Vonda N[eel] McIntyre (1948-2019) (Nature, 2005)
Flawed utopia. Eutopia that is based on the virtually complete destruction of the natural world, which is being used entirely to support the human race and anything not directly useful has disappeared.
Rpt. with the ellipsis but without the illus. in Futures from Nature. Ed. Henry Gee (New York: Tor, 2007), 194-96; and in More Alternative Truths: Stories From the Resistance. Ed. Phyllis Irene Radford, Rebecca McFarland Kyle, Lou J Berger, and Bob Brown (Benton City, WA: B Cubed Press, 2017), 176-79.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Moped Army - Paul Sizer (b. 1963) (Café Digital Comics, 2005)
Graphic novel dystopia set in a world where gasoline was illegal with a focus on conflict between the very wealth young people who live high in the cities and the poor young people who live in the crumbling underground.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Mountain Man's Toothpick" - Susan Urbanek Linville (Northwest Passages: A Cascadian Anthology, 2005)
Religious dystopia in a world where few children are born, and, if a couple do not have a child in three years, the woman is made the concubine of a fertile man.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Necessary Beggar - Susan Palwick (b. 1961) (Tor, 2005)
The dystopia of present reality contrasted with Lémabantunk, the Glorious city, which is a eutopia of peace and plenty. Fantasy elements.
Keywords: Female author; US author

No Sister of Mine - Jeanne G'Fellers (Bella Books, 2005)
First volume of a trilogy set in the far future on a planet that is divided between a patriarchal, heterosexual society known as the Autlach and an all-female telepathic society known as the Taelach. The two societies are in conflict and the all-female society is divided between those who want to enslave the Autlach and those who simply want to coexist. The Taelach society has elements of a lesbian feminist eutopia. The second volume, Sister Lost Sister Found. Tallahassee, FL: Bella Books, 2006, continues the story of the conflict between the two main societies with considerably more development of the lesbian eutopia, including a clan structure. The third volume, Sisters’ Flight. Tallahassee, FL: Bella Books, 2007, continues the story of the protagonist in 2006 G’Fellers who has become a warrior in one of the clans. All three volumes contain Glossaries, none of which include all the same words.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Perfect Dark Initial Vector - Greg[ory] Rucka (b. 1969) (Tor, 2005)
Corporate dystopia in sequel to the XBox 360 game Perfect Dark Zero and © by the Microsoft Corporation. See also his Perfect Dark Second Front. New York: Tor, 2007, which is a sequel.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Prometheus Unbound, At Last: And not a moment too soon" - Kim Stanley Robinson (b. 1952) (Nature, 2005)
Satire on the themes of science fiction and utopian literature.
Rpt. without the subtitle or the illus. in Futures from Nature. Ed. Henry Gee (New York: Tor, 2007), 239-41; and in The Best of Kim Stanley Robinson. Ed. Jonathan Strahan (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2010), 361-63.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Punk Land - Carlton Mellick III (b. 1977) (Eraserhead Press, 2005)
Dystopia of a Punk Heaven.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Quilt Cirq" - Susan Urbanek Linville (On Spec: The Canadian Magazine of the Fantastic, 2005)
Dystopia with cyberpunk elements, but with the AIDS quilt movement taken to a new level with circuits built into the quilts that contain the personality of the deceased. This is done for most who die, not just AIDS victims.
Keywords: Female author; US author

RebelFire 1.0: Out of the Gray Zone - Claire Wolfe; Aaron [S.] Zelman (1946-2010) (RebelFire Press, 2005)
A future as a dystopia in which everyone is surveilled and drugged, and there are armed patrols to ensure compliance. One young boy resists, and he finds others who are rebels. The authors include an Afterword (225-27) giving details of existing or proposed institutions and weapons that are the basis for their picture of the future.
Keywords: Female author; Male author; US author

The Red Rose Rages (Bleeding): A Short Novel - L[inda] Timmel Duchamp (b. 1950) (Aqueduct Press, 2005)
Dystopia of privatized "rehabilitation" facilities.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Smoke - Alex De Campi (IDW, 2005)
Graphic novel dystopia of violence.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Stolen Voices - Ellen Dee Davidson (b. 1954) (Lobster Press, 2005)
Young adult authoritarian dystopia with fantasy elements where sound is muted and combined, and everyone’s voice is melded so that they are controlled. A young girl leads the people to freedom by giving them back their voices and music.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Troubadour. An epic, utopian, otherworldly quest-adventure - Don Fenn (Synergy Books., 2005)
Eutopia on the planet Troubadour where people are free to make their own choices and any cooperation has to rise spontaneously and through agreement. The Earthman who is taken to the planet is a psychologist who has serious problems adjusting to the lack of structure.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Uglies - Scott [David] Westerfeld (b. 1963) (Simon Pulse, 2005)
First volume of a series originally called the Uglies trilogy, but a fourth volume was added. The first volume describes a technological eutopia in which everyone can become beautiful at age sixteen is an authoritarian dystopia. In the second volume, Pretties. New York: Simon Pulse, 2005, a girl who becomes beautiful discovers that what she thought would be eutopia is not. In the third volume, Specials. <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state>: Simon Pulse. <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">U.K.</st1:place></st1:country-region> ed. London: Simon & Schuster, 2006, the main character becomes part of the group controlling the Uglies and keeping the Pretties stupid. The fourth volume, Extras. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2007, includes the arrival of aliens, but the focus is on the role of celebrity in the future society. See also the graphic novels by Scott Westerfeld and Devin Grayson. Uglies: Cutters. Illus. Steven Cunningham. New York: Ballantine Books, 2012; and Uglies: Shay’s Story. Illus. Steven Cunningham. New York: Ballantine Books, 2012. A series of four volumes set in the same world as the Uglies series began with Impostors. New York: Scholastic Press, 2018, which describes one of the dystopian cities that emerges after the revolution in the Uglies series. The second volume, Shatter City. New York: Scholastic Press, 2019, is set in a city in which people use implants to control their emotions. The third volume, Mirror’s Edge. New York: Scholastic Press, 2021, follows one of the characters, a rebel, of the previous novels when she returns to her home city and the problems that ensue. The ending sets up a connection to the preceding Uglies series for the next volume.
Keywords: Australian author; Male author; US author

Venusia: a true story - Mark [A.] von Schlegell (b. 1957) (Semiotext(e), 2005)
Dystopia in which people are controlled by drugs, nanotechnology, and a form of psychotherapy. The first volume in his “System Series.” See also 2009 and 2015 von Schlegell.
Keywords: Male author; US author

War Surf - M[ary] M. Buckner (Ace Books, 2005)
Dystopia of corporate control in which the rich play at war.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Weapon - Michael Z. Williamson (b. 1967) (Baen, 2005)
Primarily a war and adventure story, but the setting is a future dystopia of a Fascist earth.
Keywords: English author; Male author; US author

X out of Wonderland: A Saga - David Allan Cates (b. 1956) (Steerforth Press, 2005)
Satire on the best of all possible worlds created by the beneficent "Global Free Market".
Keywords: Male author; US author

Zanesville - Kris Saknussemm (b. 1961) (Villard Books, 2005)
Corporate dystopia with fantasy elements.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"According to Their Need" - Michael A[ustin] Stackpole (b. 1957) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
Eutopia of no government or laws but with a paternalistic computer system that fills needs as it perceives them.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 377-401.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Age of Sinatra. A Novel - David Ohle (b. 1941) (Soft Skull Press, 2004)
Surrealistic dystopia set in an alternative history. Elective surgery to change body parts. Sailing on the Titanic, which has not sunk. Drugs. Weird animals, reanimated dead; regular periods of forgetting. Described as a sequel to his Motorman. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1972; rpt. Brooklyn, NY: 3rd Bed Press, 2004, which is not utopian. See also 2008 Ohle.
Parts published in different form as “Chili Hearts.” Harper’s 249.1492 (September 1974): 64-67; “Hogshead.” Transatlantic Review, no. 49 (Summer, 1974): 130-38; “The Boy Scout.” TriQuarterly 35.1 (Winter 1976): 39-40; rpt. in The Pushcart Prize, II: Best of the Small Presses (Yonkers, NY: Pushcart Press, 1977), 464-67; “Onebe and the Neutrodynes.” New Mexico Humanities Review 2.2 (Summer 1979): 51-57; “The Flocculus.” Paris Review 22.77 (Winter-Spring 1980): 16-25; rpt. in Pushcart Prize, VI: Best of the Small Presses (Yonkers, NY: Pushcart Press, 1981), 79-87; “Easy Neutronics.” A Reader of New American Fiction. Ed. Robert Fromberg and Rebecca West (Peoria, IL: I-74 Press, 1981), 37-49; “Fastest Brains Preserved.” Review of Contemporary Fiction 41 (Spring 1984): 121-24; “The Log of the Pipistred.” Missouri Review 9.2 (1986): 32-41; “The Work of Art.” Caliban, no. 8 (1990): 85-89; “The Flum.” Conjunctions 26 (Spring 1996): 236-46; “Der Kroetenkusser” Elimae http://www.elimae.com/fiction/ohle/kroetenkusser.html. Accessed March 13, 2010; “Mother and Son” Failbetter, no. 5 http://failbetter.com/05/Mother%20and%20Son.htm. Accessed March 13, 2020; and “Ratt from The Flocculus.” 3rd bed, no. 6 (2002): 131-52 http://calamaripress.com/3rdBed/3rd_Bed_Issues.htm. Accessed March 13, 2010. Other portions, some in different form, have appeared in City Moon (which was a journal co-edited by Ohle with much of the unsigned material written by the editors, and Dominion Review.
Keywords: Male author; US author

American Odyssey - Alvin Levie (b. 1927) (Trafford, 2004)
Dystopia of a future U.S. under a dictatorship. The novel follows an individual searching for those resisting the regime and the overthrow of the dictatorship and the beginnings of the reestablishment of democracy.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Among the Brave. A Shadow Children Book - Margaret Peterson Haddix (b. 1964) (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2004)
Young adult overpopulation dystopia in which each family is limited to two children. Sequel to 1998, 2001, 2002, and 2003 Haddix. See also 2005, and 2006 Haddix. In this volume, a group of the Shadow Children organize to defeat the system.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Arrivals - Naomi Gladish Smith (Chrysalis Books, 2004)
The novel follows a group of travelers into the first stage of the afterlife described by Emanuel Swedenborg (1668-1772) and their preparations for moving to other stages. See also 2007 and 2001 Smith.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Bar Code Tattoo - Suzanne Weyn (b. 1955) (Scholastic, 2004)
Dystopia in which everyone is required to get a bar code tattoo on their sixteenth birthday and one girl refuses. See also 2006 and 2012 Weyn.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Beyond Infinity - Gregory [Albert] Benford (b. 1941) (Aspect/Warner Books, 2004)
The novel is an expansion of Benford’s novella in 1990 Clarke and Benford and begins in an apparent eutopia, but the bulk of the novel is concerned, as was the novella, with an attack on the eutopia and its response. See the “Afterword” (337-38/Orbit 450-51) for an explanation of the relationship of this book to 1953 Clarke and 1990 Clarke and Benford.
U.K. ed. London: Orbit, 2004.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Civilization" - Ryan Boudinot (b. 1972) (McSweeney's, 2004)
Dystopia. A society where teenagers may be required to kill their parents as a duty; parents are expected to cooperate. No justification given. Refers to Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) as important early literature, but it is a Nineteen Eighty-Four rewritten to reflect current expectations.
Rpt. in The Best of McSweeney's Volume 2. Ed. Dave Eggers (London: Hamish Hamilton, 2005), 20-32.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Collateral Damage" - Kristine Kathryn Rusch (b. 1960) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2004)
The story presents time travel to war zones to teach children the horrors of war so that war can be eliminated and the problems involved in doing so.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"The Colonizing of Tharle" - James P[atrick] Hogan (1941-2010) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
Libertarian eutopia in which an invading force tries and fails to find a government with which to negotiate. The invasion is foiled through simple non-cooperation.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 485-509.
Keywords: English author; Irish author; Male author; US author

Coyote Rising: A Novel of Interstellar Revolution - Allen M[ulherin] Steele [Jr.] (b. 1958) (Ace Books, 2004)
Sequel to 2002 Steele. After settling a new planet and establishing a free system, the planet Coyote receives more ships from Earth and a repressive government. Struggle for freedom. See also 2005 Steele. An additional story that fits between this volume and the next one is “The River Horses.” Asimov’s Science Fiction 31.4 & 5 (375 & 376) (April-May 2007): 26-71; rpt. as The River Horses.  Burton ,  MI : Subterranean Press, 2007. His Spindrift. New York: Ace Books, 2007. U.K. ed. London: Orbit, 2007 is a first contact novel that uses the setting of the Coyote novels, and his Galaxy Blues. New York: Ace Books, 2008 is set in the same universe. Three novels that relate to and continue aspects of Coyote history are Coyote Horizon: A Novel of Interstellar Discovery. New York: Ace Books, 2009; part originally published as “Walking Star.” Forbidden Planets. Ed. Marvin Kaye (New York: Science Fiction Book Club, 2006), 49-98; Coyote Destiny: A Novel of Interstellar Discovery. New York: Ace Books, 2010; and Hex. New York: Ace Books, 2011. An additional story that fits between this volume and the next one is “The River Horses.” Asimov’s Science Fiction 31.4 & 5 (375 & 376) (April-May 2007): 26-71; rpt. as The River Horses. Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2007.
Rev. from "The Mad Woman of Shuttlefield." Asimov's Science Fiction 27.5 (328) (May 2003): 64-85; rpt. in The Year's Best SF 9. David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer (New York: Eos, 2004), 354-87; "Benjamin the Unbeliever." Asimov's Science Fiction 27.8 (August 2003): 86-130; "The Garcia Narrows Bridge." Asimov's Science Fiction 28.1 (336) (January 2004): 66-85; "Thompson's Ferry." Asimov's Science Fiction 28.3 (338) (March 2004): 84-96; "Incident at Goat Kill Creek." Asimov's Science Fiction 28.4 & 5 (339 & 340) (April/May 2004): 82-124; "Shady Grove." Asimov's Science Fiction 28.7 (342) (July 2004): 16-47; "Liberation Day." Asimov's Science Fiction 28.10 & 11 (October-November 2004): 188-229; and "Home of the Brave." Asimov's Science Fiction 28.12 (347) (December 2004): 46-60.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Crux - Albert E[dward] Cowdrey (b. 1933) (Tor, 2004)
Post-catastrophe authoritarian dystopia.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Curious Notions. Crosstime Traffic--Book Two - Harry [Norman] Turtledove (b. 1949) (Tor, 2004)
Young adult dystopia in a series in which travel between parallel timelines, for harvesting resources, has become possible in the late 21st century. In this volume, Germany won World War I and now dominates the world. Other volumes in the series include 2006, 2007, and 2008 Turtledove and two non-utopian volumes, Gunpowder Empire: Crosstime Traffic--Book One. New York: Tor, 2003; and In High Places: Crosstime Traffic--Book Three. New York: Tor, 2006.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Delhi" - Vandana Singh (b. 1950) (So Long Been Dreaming, 2004)
The story contrasts the dystopian present of India with brief flashes of eutopian and dystopian futures.
Rpt. in People of Colo(u)r Destroy Science Fiction! Ed. Nalo Hopkinson and Kristine Ong Muslin Special Issue of Lightspeed, no. 73 (June 2016): 229-42; and in The Best of World SF: Volume 1. Ed. Lavie Tidhar (London: Ad Astra/Head of Zeus, 2021), 125-47.
Keywords: Female author; Indian author; US author

"Devil's Star" - Jack [John Stewart] Williamson (1908-2006) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
Libertarian eutopia with a barter economy, custom, and altruism contrasted with an authoritarian dystopia fearful of all free societies.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 431-51; and in The Human Limit: The Collected Stories of Jack Williamson. Volume 8 (Royal Oak, MI: Haffner Press, 2011), 369-88.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Dogs and Water - Anders Nilsen (b. 1973) (Drawn & Quarterly, 2004)
Graphic novel dystopia with no words in which a boy wanders through a largely destroyed landscape.
Rpt. with a few additional pages Montréal, QC, Canada: Drawn & Quarterly, 2007.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Falling Star" - Brendan DuBois (Space Stations, 2004)
Dystopia of a future anti-technological, religious U.S. small town.
Rpt. in The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-second Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner Dozois (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2005), 471-83.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Fitzpatrick's War - Theodore Judson (b. 1951) (DAW Books, 2004)
The novel is structured as a critical edition of a memoir of a future conflict published in a postwar dystopia with rigid class and gender distinctions.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Folkhaven - Robert L. Courtney (Trafford, 2004)
The novel focuses on a successful family with deep roots in a small farming community. The community experiences ethnic and racial issues, and the novel has clear racist and anti-immigrant themes, and the family goes on to create the first of what is to become white-only, Nordic-based Folkhaven communities. The book ends with “The Folkhaven Community Concept” (348-62).
Keywords: Male author; US author

For Us, The Living: A Comedy of Customs - Robert A[nson] Heinlein (1907-88) (Scribner, 2004)
Written in 1939. This is Heinlein's first novel, which was rejected by publishers at the time and thought lost. Libertarian eutopia with clear divisions between what is in the public and private spheres and a system of social credit or "heritage checks" that provides everyone a basic guaranteed income. Many technological advances, some of which Heinlein used later.
Rpt. as vol. 4 of The Virginia Edition of his works. Decatur, GA: Meisha Merlin, 2006 and separately Houston, TX: The Virginia Edition, 2008.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Forced Conversion - Donald J. Bingle (b. 1954) (Five Star, 2004)
Dystopia in which most people have retreated to virtual reality, and there is an organized effort to force the rest to join them. Struggle between the two groups.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Freehold - Michael Z. Williamson (b. 1967) (Baen, 2004)
Dystopia and eutopia describing an authoritarian government and a libertarian enclave primarily concerned with conflict. First volume in a long series with a sub-series. Other volumes include The Weapon. New York: Baen, 2005; Contact with Chaos. New York: Baen, 2009; Rogue. New York: Baen, 2011; and Angeleyes. New York: Baen, 2016. The Ripple Creek subseries includes Better to Forgiveness. New York: Baen, 2007; Do Unto Others. New York: Baen, 2010; and When Diplomacy Fails. New York: Baen, 2012. There are also three anthologies edited by Williamson with contributions by him and others Forged in Blood. New York: Baen, 2017  Freehold Resistance. New York: Baen, 2019; and Freehold Defiance. New York: Baen, 2019.
Keywords: English author; Male author; US author

Frek and the Elixir - Rudy [Rudolf von Bitter] Rucker (b. 1946) (Tor, 2004)
A humorous flawed utopia set in 3003. An apparent eutopia based on biotechnology is an authoritarian dystopia using memory control. All Earth's plant and animal species have disappeared or been modified out of recognition and replaced with species that could be sold at a profit, and part of the novel is concerned with the attempt to restore them.
Part originally published as "Frek in the Grulloo Woods." Living without a Net. Ed. Lou Anders (New York: Roc, 2003), 213-28.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Futureways (Arsenal Pulp Press/Whitney Museum of American Art/Printed Matter, Inc., 2004)
Fourteen stories from thirteen authors with only the first story with an identified author. All the stories are set in or refer to futures, mostly dystopian, and connect to art exhibits. The authors listed are Laura Cottingham, as Ying Zong 4217 [pseud.]; Nick Crowe; Aline Duriaud; Nalo Hopkinson; Nico Israel; Matthew Licht; Peter Maass; Rita McBride; Alexandre Melo, whose story was translated from the Portuguese by Brad Cherry; Glen Rubsamen; Brad Schafer; Mark von Schlegell; and Roger Wolfson.
Keywords: Canadian author; Dutch author; Female author; German author; Portuguese author; UK author; US author

The Gift Moves - Steve Lyon (Houghton Mifflin, 2004)
Young adult eutopia describing a future that has little technology and operates on the basis of gifting.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Gifts - Ursula K[roeber] Le Guin (1929-2018) (Harcourt, 2004)
First volume of a young adult trilogy. The setting is a country in which individual families have gifts that were mostly destructive and the need to learn to control them. In the second volume, Voices. Orlando, FL: Harcourt, 2006, the people are enslaved by a people who outlaw reading. In the third volume, Powers. Orlando, FL: Harcourt, 2007, a young boy escapes slavery and explores his world and his gift of foreseeing the future.
The three volumes are rpt. in her Annals of the Western Shore: Gifts Voices Powers. Ed. Brian Attebery (New York: Library of America, 2020), with Gifts (1-148), Voices (149-336), and Powers (337-614), a Note on the Texts (666), and a list of corrected typographical errors (667). The volume also includes a Chronology (651-65) Le Guin’s “The Young Adult in YA: Talk delivered to the American Library Association (2004)” (617-26, with notes on 668-70) [Originally published in her Cheek by Jowl (Seattle, WA: Aqueduct Press, 2009), 110-23]; and “Some Assumptions about Fantasy: Talk delivered at Book Expo America June 4, 2004” (627-29, with notes on 670) [Originally published in her Cheek by Jowl (Seattle, WA: Aqueduct Press, 2009), 4-7], and interviews of Le Guin with Paola Castagno 2006 (630-33, with notes on 670-71) [Originally publish in Spanish on Castagno’s website Doce Moradas and in English on Le Guin’s website, http:/www.ursulakleguin.com/doce-moradas], Brian Attebery February 17, 2007 (634-38, with notes on 671-72) [Originally published in Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts 17.4 (2007): 371-75], and Alexander Chee February 5, 2008 (639-47), with notes on 672) [Originally published in Guernica, heets://www.guernicamag.com.breaking_into_the_spell_I/.
Keywords: Female author; US author

God in the Image of Woman - D[avid] V. Bernard (Strebor Books International, 2004)
Dystopia where no women are born.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"High Rise High" - Kit [Lilian Craig] Reed (1932-2017) (Polyphony, 2004)
Dystopia. A high rise high school built to house the town's most difficult students is taken over by the students.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Jumpers" - Mary Rosenblum (1952-2018) (SciFiction, 2004)
Authoritarian corporate dystopia.
Keywords: Female author; US author

KD Rebel - David [Eden] Lane (1938-2007) (jrbooksonline.com, 2004)
Rebels against miscegenation move to the Rocky Mountain states and establish “Kinsland” and call themselves the Kinsland Defenders (KD). The novel is about the beginnings of an ideal white society. For his “88 Precepts,” the principles on which the society is based, and which is referred to throughout the novel, see https://archive.org/stream/88Precepts_937/88Precepts_djvu.txt.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"King Tide" - Alison Wilson (Little Blue Marble: Stories of Our Changing Climate, 2004)
Dystopia of a New York City mostly under water.
Originally published in Terraform (2004)
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Lady and the Tiger - Jody Lynn Nye (b. 1957) (Ace Books, 2004)
Flawed utopia. A planet believed to be perfect is not. A previous novel with the same characters is her Taylor's Ark. New York: Ace Books, 1993.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Leviathan Wept" - Daniel [James] Abraham (b. 1969) (SciFiction, 2004)
Authoritarian dystopia produced by the policies against terrorism in which both sides kill with impunity.
Rpt. in The Year's Best SF: Twenty-Second Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner Dozois (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2005), 283-99.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Madame President: The Unauthorized Biography of the First Green Party President. Imagine if we had a Green Party President on September 11, 2001 - Mark A. Dunlea (Big Toad Books, 2004)
Eutopia produced by a Green Party US president, who improves the environment and health care and puts the Green Party vision of gender and racial relations, energy policy, and foreign policy into practice.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Martingale Inequalities" - Karen Sandler (Neo-Opsis: Science Fiction Magazine, 2004)
Religious dystopia and struggle against it.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Master of None - N[ancy] Lee Wood (b. 1955) (Warner Aspect, 2004)
Set in a matriarchal society where men have no rights whatsoever but which, over the course of the novel, becomes more egalitarian and eutopian.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Men Are Trouble" - James Patrick Kelly (b. 1951) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2004)
A future world without men in which most work is done by robots, and the women struggle to find meaning in their lives. His “The Last Judgment.” Asimov's Science Fiction 36.4&5 (435 & 436) (April/May 2012): 10-49 is set in the same future and has the same protagonist, Fay Hardaway, a private detective.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Molôn Labé! - [Kenneth W.] [Royce] (Javelin Press, 2004)
The United States has become an authoritarian dystopia, but the state of Wyoming stands up for independence and freedom. The author says that the novel is based on the assumption that the federal government will try to confiscate guns, that there will be a depression deliberately brought about by the government, that parts of the U.S. will try to secede, and that the government will try to crush the rebellion.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Moments of Inertia" - William [Renald] Barton [III] (b. 1950) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2004)
A complex story with various flashbacks and flash forwards. The end of the world but with a small group moved to a heaven in which they are nude and younger.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Neurolink - M[ary] M. Buckner (Ace Books, 2004)
Sequel of sorts to 2003 Buckner set in the twenty-third century. Corporations have replaced nations and most of the world’s population are slaves owned by the corporations. A clone and an AI loaded with the same characteristics must work together,
Rpt. as The Coin Giver. Np: ereads.com, 2009. Rpt. under that title New York: Open Road Integrated Media, 2014 ebook. UK. ed. under that title London: Gateway/Orion, 2012 ebook.
Keywords: Female author; US author

One Nation Under God - Vincent M. Wales (DGC Press, 2004)
Religious dystopia set in 2021 to 2030 in which fundamentalist Christians have come to power in the U.S., eliminated civil liberties, and instituted rigid control. By the end of the novel, the regime has been defeated.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Ordinary - Jim Grimsley (b. 1955) (Tom Doherty Associates, 2004)
Overpopulated, technological, authoritarian dystopia in contact with what they think of as a primitive culture. The primitive society is a complex ancient flawed eutopia based on magic. Some of the background is given in his fantasy Kirith Kirin. Decatur, GA: Meisha Merlin, 2000. His The Last Green Tree. New York: Tor, 2006 is set in the same universe but is fantasy.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Oval Menace - James E. Couch (iUniverse, 2004)
Dystopia in the U.S. after a Democratic woman is elected President in 2004. She quickly emerges as a dictator who will stop at nothing to get her own way. She pulls all troops back to the U.S. to create an isolationist Fortress America, which leads to major geopolitical shifts in the world and damages the economy. The author was a foreign service office and then a professor at Florida International University, retiring in 1993.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Pakeha" - Jane [M.] Lindskold (b. 1962) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
Libertarian eutopia. A virus that destroys all petroleum products devastates the world economy. New Zealand chooses to eliminate government. Pākehā, which now refers to white New Zealanders, comes to mean someone who has earned the right to live there.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 403-30.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"The People of Sand and Slag" - Paolo [Tadini] Bacigalupi (b. 1972) (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2004)
Far future environmental dystopia.
Rpt. in The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-second Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner Dozois (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2005), 122-36; in Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2008), 39-54; in his Pump Six and Other Stories (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2008), 49-67; and in Apocalypse Now: Poems and Prose from the End of Days. Ed. Andrew McFadyen and Alexander Lumans (Nashville, TN: Upper Rubber Boot, 2012), 148-65.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The People of Sparks - Jeanne DuPrau (b. 1944) (Random House, 2004)
Sequel to 2003 DuPrau in which the people of the city of Ember deal with conflicts with the people living on the surface. See also 2008 DuPrau.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Peregrines" - Suzy McKee Charnas (1939-2023) (SciFiction, 2004)
Fantasy with a dystopian background extrapolated from the threats to democracy brought about by the response to terrorism in the United States.
Rpt. in her Stagestruck Vampires & Other Phantasms (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2004), 211-51.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Pervert" - Charles Coleman Finlay (b. 1964) (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2004)
Dystopia of complete separation of men and women with both having to be covered from head to toe when they might be in the same areas. The pervert is a heterosexual.
Rpt. in Brave New Worlds. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2011), 97-106; 2nd ed. as Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2012), 97-106.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Peter Skilling" - Alex[ander Christian] Irvine (b. 1969) (Salon.com, 2004)
Future authoritarian dystopia based on the U.S. response to terrorism.
Rpt. in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science 107.3 (632) (September 2004): 116-29; and in Brave New Worlds. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2011), 179-89; 2nd ed. as Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories. ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2012), 179-89.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Plot Against America - Philip [Milton] Roth (1933-2018) (Houghton, Mifflin, 2004)
Alternative history in which Charles A. Lindbergh (1902-74) won the 1940 presidential election and Lindbergh was a Nazi sympathizer who cooperated with Adolf Hitler. Roth called it “an American dystopia;” qtd. in the TLS (December 23 & 30, 2005): 20. A six-episode television mini-series created and directed by David Simon (b. 1960) and Ed Burns (b. 1946) was shown on HBO March 16 - April 20, 2020, with the first three episodes directed by Minkie Spiro and the last three by Thomas Schlamme (b. 1950).
Rpt. in Philip Roth, Novels 2001-2007 (New York: The Library of America, 2013), 93-458 with “Notes on the Text” by Ross Miller (683-89).
Keywords: Male author; US author

Prince of Christler-Coke - Neal [Patrick] Barrett Jr. (1929-2014) (Golden Gryphon Press, 2004)
Dystopia of struggle among the nobility in a future degenerated America.
Parts were originally published in different form in his Slightly Off Center: Eleven Extraordinarily Exhilarating Tales. Austin, TX: Swan Press, 1992, 5-19, which says that “Buckstop” (5-19) will be chapter 10 of Prince of Christler-Coke, but it isn’t, and the chapters have no titles. Parts were also originally published in Ten Tales. Huntington Beach, CA: James Cahill Publishing, 1994.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"A Reception at the Anarchist Embassy" - Brad[ford Swain] Linaweaver (1952-2019) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
Discussion of various anarchist attempts at eutopia and their differences contrasted with an Earth that has become rule-bound.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 363-76.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Rings of Allah - Lee Boyland (AuthorHouse, 2004)
Dystopia. The lead up to a successful Islamist terrorist attack on five cities in the U.S. using nuclear weapons. First volume of a trilogy In the middle volume by Boyland with Vista Boyland, Behold, an Ashen Horse. A Novel. Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2007, Islamist terrorists strike throughout the world and the U.S. defends itself using nuclear weapons against many countries throughout the world and, at the end, on Mecca. In the final volume, by Boyland and Boyland, America Reborn. [Bangor, ME]: BookLocker.com, 2009, where for the first time the trilogy is called The Clash-of-Civilizations Trilogy, the U.S. successfully struggles against both internal and external enemies and ends with the re-election of the heroic president with plans for a new U.S. Constitution.
Keywords: Female author; Male author; US author

Second Coming - [John Robert] [Jones] (b. 1926) (Baen, 2004)
Second Coming of Christ as a Black Canadian. Emphasis is on the struggle between his message and the expectations of Christians.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Shackles of Freedom" - Mike [Michael Diamond] Resnick (1942-2020); Tobias S[amuel] Buckell (b. 1979) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
The Amish, presented in their most extreme form, move to a new planet, New Pennsylvania, to be free to follow their beliefs. The stress is on the lack of medical care that results from their unwillingness to use modern technology.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 347-62.
Keywords: British Virgin Islands author; Grenadian author; Male author; US author; US Virgin Islands author

Sleep - Kat Meads (Livingston Press of the University of West Alabama, 2004)
Corporate dystopia and revolt.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Start the Clock" - Benjamin [Micah] Rosenbaum (b. 1969) (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2004)
Dystopia in which people can control the process of aging and many choose to stop before puberty and these people dominate society.
Rpt. in The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-second Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner Dozois (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2005), 22-33.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Thinner Than Thou - Kit [Lilian Craig] Reed (1932-2017) (Tor, 2004)
Dystopia with a new religion of thinness.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Third Revolution - Anthony F. Lewis (Ten Mile Press, 2004)
Dystopia in which the governor of Montana fights back against attempts by the federal government to take over state functions. He is joined by leaders from North and South Dakota, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. See also 2006 Lewis.
2nd ed. [Fort, Bragg, CO]: Ten Mile Press, 2005
Keywords: Male author; US author

A Time to Die - Mickey Zucker Reichert (b. 1962) (Five Star, 2004)
Dystopia set in 2030 when the Moralist Party has promised to end death and everyone is kept alive as long as possible.
2004 Reichert, Mickey Zucker (b. 1962). A Time to Die. Waterville, ME: Five Star. PSt Dystopia set in 2030 when the Moralist Party has promised to end death and everyone is kept alive as long as possible. The female author is a pediatrician.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Truesight - David Stahler Jr. (Eos, 2004)
Young adult dystopia. Authoritarian community where everyone is supposed to be blind; stress on the struggles of dissidents and a boy who gains his sight. First volume of a trilogy. In the second volume, The Seer. New York: Eos, 2007, the boy escapes to a sighted city which turns out to be another dystopia. At the end of the novel he returns to his first community but with a sense of a better possibility. In the third volume, Otherspace. New York: Eos, 2008, the protagonist searches for, and finds, a planet where those who were blind but can now see will be safe.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Turing Test" - Robert R[eynolds] Chase (b. 1948) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2004)
Eutopian and dystopia potential of computer programs and computer viruses.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Ultraviolet Night" - Jim [James M.] Young (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2004)
Corporate dystopia.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Unnullified World" - Lloyd Biggle Jr. (1923-2002) (Visions of Liberty, 2004)
Libertarian eutopia with no laws and everyone collectively enforces the society's standards of good behavior. Property ownership can be enforced by the owner.
Rpt. in Freedom! Ed. Martin H[arry] Greenberg and Mark Tier (New York: Baen, 2006), 315-36.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Utopia Revisited: A 21st Century Account of a Diplomatic Visit to the Island Nation of Utopia. The Best State of a Commonwealth. A Novella - John William McMullen (iUniverse, 2004)
The country of Utopia is now a dystopia seen through the eyes of a member of the Vatican Diplomatic Corps visiting Utopia to try to secure the release of a cousin of Houghton Hythloday, a descendent of Raphael Hythloday. The Vatican representative ends up being jailed. Written from a Roman Catholic viewpoint. See also 2005 McMullen.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Utopia X - [William] Scott Wilson (iUniverse, 2004)
The dystopia brought about by multiculturalism in the U.S. by 2048 where “political correctness” is enforced by law.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Voluntary State" - Christopher Rowe (b. 1969) (SciFiction, 2004)
Future dystopia in Tennessee in which everyone is controlled by a central computer contrasted with a free Kentucky. The story focuses on a successful attempt by men from Kentucky to destroy the computer. A related novella is “The Border State.” In his Telling the Map: Stories Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2017), 149-269 which is set further in the future when Tennessee has infected the rivers around the state with various machines that kill anyone that crosses them or get wet. Kentucky has means of temporarily neutralizing the machines. A related novel set later in time is his These Prisoning Hills. New York: Tordotcom, 2022.
Rpt. in The Year's Best SF: Twenty-Second Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner Dozois (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2005), 58-83; Science Fiction: The Best of 2004. Ed. Karen Haber and Jonathan Strahan (New York: iBooks, 2005); Beyond Singularity. Ed. Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois (New York: Ace Books, 2005); Nebula Awards Showcase 2006. Ed. Gardner Dozois. New York: Roc, 2006); Rewired: The Post-Cyberpunk Anthology. Ed. James P. Kelley and John Kessel (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2007), 293-327; and in his Telling the Map: Stories (Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2017), 107-48.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Wired - Robert L. Wise (b. 1939) (Warner Faith, 2004)
Post rapture dystopia (see 1 Corinthians 15:52 and 1 Thessalonians 4: 15-17). His Tagged. New York: Warner Faith, 2004 is a sequel.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Xen: Ancient English Edition Complete & Unexpurgated - D. J. Solomon Trans. [Written by] (Avar Press, 2004)
Detailed flawed utopia. Much satire. Homo sapiens (man the wise) evolves into Femina persapiens (woman the wiser). There is a Lexicon defining abbreviations and some of the language used.
Keywords: US author

"A 2020 Vision" - Ann Florini (The Coming Democracy: New Rules for Running a New World, 2003)
Non-fiction eutopian projection of what the author sees as current trends and mostly concerned with international relations and economic development.
Keywords: Female author; US author

America II: The Second Republic 2004 - 2204. An Historic and Historical Novel about the Future of America - [Thomas Renfro] [Henley] (b. 1931) (Trafford, 2003)
Right wing eutopia based on a radically downsized federal government with all constitutional amendments after the Bill of Rights rescinded, power in state governments, and few national administrative bodies. English the official language. All non-citizens expelled. Eliminate all state departments of education, schools of education, tenure, and teachers; unions, and return to the curriculum of the past. Children have no rights before age twenty-one.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Among the Barons - Margaret Peterson Haddix (b. 1964) (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2003)
Young adult overpopulation dystopia in which each family is limited to two children. Sequel to 1998, 2001, and 2002 Haddix. See also 2004, 2005, and 2006 Haddix. This volume is a continuation of the story of the boy in 2001 Haddix.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Baby Squad - Andrew Neiderman (b. 1940) (Pocket Star Books, 2003)
Dystopia in which natural birth is outlawed.
Keywords: Male author; US author

A Better World's in Birth! - Howard Waldrop (1946-2024) (Golden Gryphon Press, 2003)
Ghost story set in a dystopian people's republic in an alternative history.
Rpt. in Other Worlds, Better Lives: Selected Long Fiction 1989-2005. A Howard Waldrop Reader (Baltimore, MD: Old Earth Books, 2008), 231-58 with an "Afterword" (259-60).
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Birth Days" - Geoff[rey Charles] Ryman (b. 1951) (Interzone, 2003)
Dystopia and eutopia. Future in which the identification of homosexual genes allows such fetuses to be aborted. This is followed by the development of technology that allows homosexuals to give birth and the growth of large families of gay men and their children.
Rpt. in The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-First Annual Collection. Ed. Gardner [Raymond] Dozois (New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2004), 388-98; and in his Paradise Tales (Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2011), 47-61.
Keywords: Canadian author; Male author; UK author; US author

"Boys" - [Agnes] Carol[lyn] [Fries] Emshwiller (1921-2019) (SciFiction, 2003)
Primitive dystopia of gender separation where two warring tribes of males prey on each other and the village of women. The women revolt.
Rpt. in The James Tiptree Award Anthology 1. Ed. Karen Joy Fowler, Pat Murphy, Debbie Notkin, and Jeffrey D. Smith (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2003), 45-60; and in her I Live With You (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon, 2005), 47-63; and in Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology. Ed. Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer (Oakland, CA: PM Press, 2015), 235-47.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Bread and Bombs" - M[ary Beth] Rickert (b. 1959) (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 2003)
Dystopia of ethnic conflict told from the point of view of an adult remembering childhood.
Rpt. in Year's Best SF 9. Ed. David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer (New York: Eos, 2004), 388-403; and in Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2008), 55-65.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The City of Ember - Jeanne DuPrau (b. 1944) (Random House, 2003)
Mildly dystopian young adult novel of a dying underground city and the struggle of two young people to find the way out. Her The Prophet of Yonwood. New York: Random House, 2006 is a prequel See also 2004 and 2008 DuPrau.
The City of Ember. Deluxe Edition. the first Book of Ember. New York: Random, 2013, includes “Introduction to the Deluxe Edition” (ix-xii) and “On the Day of the Bombs” (277-92) , which gives the background to the establishment of the city of Sparks, the focus of the second volume in the series, and, inside the back cover, a poster.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Clade - [Robert] Mark Budz (b. 1960) (Bantam Books, 2003)
Future dystopia set mostly in San Jose, California. Genetic engineering, drugs, violence, and struggles for power. Crache. New York: Bantam Books, 2004 is a sequel.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Cleansing Fire of God" - Jay [Joseph Edward] Lake [Jr.] (1964-2014) (Strange Horizons, 2003)
The Earth is divided among religious dystopias and at least one secular society, and they are in competition to reach the moon, where an alien spacecraft has crashed.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Darwin’s Children - Greg[ory Dale] Bear (1951-2022) (Del Rey/Ballantine, 2003)
Sequel to Darwin’s Radio. New York: Del Rey/Ballantine, 1999, which concerned the discovery of the DNA that brought about the disease that resulted in the children. The volume includes an “Afterword” (419), “A Short Biological Primer” (422-23) and a “Short Glossary of Scientific Terms” (423-27). The advanced children described in that novel have matured and ae threatened by those who resent their powers. As a result, they are interned in special schools and targeted by bounty hunters as part of a plan to eliminate them. The volume includes “Caveats” (375-76), a “Short Glossary of Scientific Terms” (377-83), and “A Brief Reading List” (385-87).
Keywords: Male author; US author

Dear Abbey - Terry [Ballantine] Bisson (1942-2024) (PS Publishing, 2003)
Time travel tale which takes two people through many future stops to the end of the human race millions of years in the future. The first stops include environmental catastrophes, while later stops briefly depict eutopias built on the ruins.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Drop City - T[homas] Coraghessan Boyle (b. 1948) (Viking, 2003)
The novel uses the name of an actual intentional community but has little to do with that community. The community the novel presents is dystopian in all the ways that the Sixties communities were assumed to be but rarely were, a depiction disputed by those who lived there.
Keywords: Male author; US author

End of State. Based on the Best Selling Left Behind® Series - Neesa Hart (Tyndale House Publishers, 2003)
First volume of a spinoff from 1995 LaHaye and Jenkins following the political results of the Rapture (See 1 Corinthians 15:52 and 1 Thessalonians 4: 15-17). The other volumes are Impeachable Offense: Based on the Best Selling Left Behind® Series. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2004; and Necessary Evils: Based on the Best Selling Left Behind® Series. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2005.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Enemies Foreign and Domestic - Matthew Bracken (b. 1957) (Steelcutter Publishing, 2003)
The U.S. government uses a rigged attack on people in a football stadium as an excuse for confiscating all assault weapons and more generally restricting freedom. First volume of a trilogy. In the second volume, Domestic Enemies. The Reconquista. Orange Park, FL: Steelcutter Publishing, 2006, the U.S. begins to fall apart and loses the Southwest, which becomes a separate nation called Aztlan. The third volume, Foreign Enemies and Traitors [Cover adds The Greater Depression and Civil War 2]. Orange Park, FL: Steelcutter Publishing, 2009, focuses on the struggle to defend the U.S. Constitution during Civil War and economic depression.
7th ed. Orange Park, FL: Steelcutter Publishing, 2009.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"General Density" - [Stephen] [Kaufman] (b. 1947) (Challenging Destiny, 2003)
Dystopian background to a science story. The dystopia developed after both the world economic and environmental systems collapse. Most people left for space colonies around the Earth.
Rpt in Northwest Passages: A Cascadian Anthology. Ed. Chris DiMarco (Port Orchard, OR: Fandom Press, 2005), 303-22; and in his Counting Tadpoles (Hornsea, Eng.: PS Publishing, 2009), 173-91.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Green Leopard Plague" - Walter Jon Williams (b. 1953) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2003)
Eutopia brought about through cloning and biotechnology. Set in the same universe as 1997 Williams.
Rpt. in his The Green Leopard Plague and Other Stories (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2010), 107-63 with an "Afterword" on 164-65.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Greetings" - Terry [Ballantine] Bisson (1942-2024) (SciFiction, 2003)
A story with a theme similar to Trollope’s (1881-2) “The Fixed Period” and others in which there is an agreement to die at a certain age and the effects on people as they approach that age to die, including, in this case, a resistance movement. In the story, people are chosen by lot for the Sunset Brigade and are informed ten days before they must appear. Many people who are terminally ill volunteer, but improved medical care for the young, means that the age at which people are chosen must be lowered, with the man chosen in the story being 70. A “hemlock kit” is provided for those who choose to die at home.
Rpt. in his Greetings and Other Stories (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2005), 191-276.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Happiness Code - Amy Herrick (Viking, 2003)
The effects of finding a gene for happiness focusing on one family that finds a "perfectly happy baby" in its back garden.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Hard Times" - Neal [Patrick] Barrett Jr. (1929-2014) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2003)
Dystopia. An extreme version of owing the company store in that it control your genitals.
Keywords: Male author; US author

A Hill of the Ravens - H[arold] A[rmstead] Covington (b. 1953) (1st Books, 2003)
Dystopia at the end of the twenty-first century in a North America that has broken up into separate enclaves based on ethnicity or ideology. The Southwest is Aztlan, a Spanish-speaking state. The Northwest to Alaska is a white, fascist dictatorship.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Holy Land - Robert Zubrin (b. 1952) (Polaris Books, 2003)
Dystopia. Satire on current world politics.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Hyperthought - M[ary] M. Buckner (Ace Books, 2003)
Ecological and corporate dystopia set in 2125 with the only people in the world in the Arctic, the dystopia, and in the Antarctic, where there is a small community of free people. Has a subtheme of the problems brought about by a process for supposedly improving brain function. Includes a small community of free people. See also 2004 Buckner.
Keywords: Female author; US author

In & Oz - Steve Tomasula (Ministry of Whimsy Press, 2003)
A somewhat surrealistic dystopia describing two flawed cities, representing current reality and dreams of a better place, and the way five people, all artists in one way or another, move between them.
Keywords: Male author; US author

In the Presence of Mine Enemies - Harry [Norman] Turtledove (b. 1949) (New American Library, 2003)
Alternative history in which National Socialists dominate.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Jesus Freaks" - Jennifer [Mitchell] Roberson (b. 1953) (Women Writing Science Fiction as Men, 2003)
Jesus returns regularly to various times and places for brief periods to try to correct faults being made in his name. In this case, it is to a religious dystopia dominated by Christian fundamentalists.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Jon" - George Saunders (b. 1958) (The New Yorker, 2003)
Dystopia in which most children are raised in a controlled environment where they help develop products contrasted with an outside world in which people are free to live in families but have more difficult lives.
Rpt. in Science Fiction: The Best of 2003. Ed. Karen Haber and Jonathan Strahan (New York: iBooks, 2004), 149-83; and in his In Persuasion Nation. Stories (New York: Riverhead Books, 2006), 23-61.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Looking Through Lace" - Ruth Nestvold (b. 1958) (Asimov's Science Fiction, 2003)
A feminist eutopia with female and male languages.
Rpt. in The James Tiptree Award Anthology 1. Ed. Karen Joy Fowler, Pat Murphy, Debbie Notkin, and Jeffrey D. Smith (San Francisco, CA: Tachyon Publications, 2003), 131-86.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Magister - Sally Miller Gearhart (1931-2021) (Spinsters Ink Books, 2003)
Book Two of Earthkeep. See 2002 Gearhart. In the first volume all the animals in the world had disappeared; in this volume the children begin to die. The novel focuses on the developing understanding of the need to abolish all authority structures. At the end, both the children and the animals reappear. New Age anarchism. A third volume, The Steward, was announced but disappeared from the author’s website. The author’s best-known book is The Wanderground: Stories of the Hill Women, 1978.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Maul - Tricia Sullivan (b. 1968) (Orbit, 2003)
Violent dystopia.
Keywords: Female author; UK author; US author

Memini - Daniel [David] Pearlman (1935-2013) (Prime Books, 2003)
Satire. A dystopian future with the mentally damaged in power.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Messages from the Hollow Earth - Dianne Robbins (b. 1939) (Trafford, 2003)
New Age eutopia. See also 1996 and 2000 Robbins.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Milan - Nick Sturley (b. 1967) (Trafford, 2003)
In 2030, with signing a recognized language, a deaf teacher of history in the London Model Deaf School, is teaching his last class before retirement. In it he tells a story about the struggle against oralism, an attempt to impose oralism, the requirement that the deaf speak and cannot sign. In the novel, the story is fantasy and science fiction, but it was inspired by the Second International Congress on the Education of the Deaf held in Milan in 1880 that concluded that speech rather than signing was the best approach to deaf education. The delegates from Great Britain and the United States voted against the resolutions. There was only one deaf delegate to the conference. Signing was banned in many schools for the deaf and deaf teachers lost their jobs. Some schools chose to keep signing, and, of course, many deaf students continued to sign among themselves. The novel ends with the suggest that attempts to impose oralism will continue. There is a “Visual Glossary” illus. Adam Hoy on 212-33 of “Key Characters” (214-21) and Architectural Features (223-33).
Keywords: Deaf author; English author; US author

"Of a Sweet Slow Dance in the Wake of Temporary Dogs" - Adam-Troy Castro (b. 1960) (Imaginings: An Anthology of Long Short Fiction, 2003)
Flawed eutopia in which one can have everything one could want for nine days in exchange for one day of hell.
Rpt. in Nebula Awards Showcase 2005: The Year’s Best SF and Fantasy Selected by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America®. Ed. Jack [Mayo] Dann (New York: Roc, 2005), 227-47; and in Brave New Worlds. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2011), 431-49; 2nd ed. as Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories. Ed. John Joseph Adams (San Francisco, CA: Night Shade Books, 2012), 431-49.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The One and the Golden Circle - Don Allen Beene (1936-2012) (iUniverse, 2003)
New Age novel presenting the dystopia of contemporary and near future Haiti with the suggestion of a eutopian future.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Other Cities - Benjamin [Micah] Rosenbaum (b. 1969) (Small Beer Press, 2003)
Collection of very short descriptions of imaginary cities. Given how short each description is, it is impossible to treat any single one as utopian, but collectively there are a number of utopian and dystopian motifs present.
All but one, "The City of Peace", were previously published; "The White City" was published in Vestal Review, no 9 (April 2002) [www.vestalreview.net] and the rest in Strange Horizons (September 17, 2001; October 15, 2001; November 19, 2001; December 17, 2001; January 21, 2002; February 18, 2002; March 18, 2002; April 15, 2002; May 20, 2002; June 17, 2002; July 15, 2002; August 19, 2002) [www.strangehorizons.com].
Keywords: Male author; US author

“Out of Plato’s Cave” - J. Alan Erwine (b. 1969) (Aphelion, 2003)
The story is set in a future where many people are living underground to escape radiation and is told from the perspective of a young boy with cancer who is attracted to the surface.
Rpt. in the author's J Alan Erwine’s Tales of Dystopia (Np: [J. Alan Erwine, 2016]), 64-69.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Parecon: Life After Capitalism - Michael Albert (b. 1947) (Verso, 2003)
Non-fiction that includes a section on "Daily Life in a Participatory Democracy" (171-230) that is eutopian. See also 2017 Albert.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Saturn - Ben[jamin William] Bova (1932-2020) (Hodder & Stoughton, 2003)
A trip to Saturn from an Earth that is a religious dystopia. The religious leaders infiltrate the crew in an attempt, which fails, to establish the same regime on Saturn.
U.S. ed. New York: Tor, 2003.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Seventh Seal: A Novel of the Last Days - Jessica Draper; Richard Draper (Covenant Communications, 2003)
Dystopia of the end of the world in Revelations from a Mormon perspective. First volume of a trilogy. This volume introduces the subject. In the second volume, Rising Storm: The Seventh Seal Epic Continues. American Fork, UT: Covenant Communications, 2004, natural and human disasters escalate. The final volume, Final Hour: The Dramatic Conclusion to the Seventh Seal Epic. American Fork, UT: Covenant Communications, 2004, volume takes the story to Armageddon (See Revelation 16) and the Second Coming of Christ.
Keywords: Female author; Male author; US author

Snare: A Novel of the Far Future - Katharine [Nancy Brahtin] Kerr (b. 1944) (Tor, 2003)
Islamic fundamentalists control a planet. Includes an attempt at reform
U.K. ed. London: HarperCollins, 2003.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Soon: The Beginning of the End - Jerry B[ruce] Jenkins (b. 1949) (Tyndale House Publishers, 2003)
First volume of the Left Behind Soon Series, a spinoff from 1995 LaHaye and Jenkins. This series has been renamed the Underground Zealot Series. In this volume religion is outlawed. Sequels include Silenced: The Wrath of God Descends. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House, 2004, in which the persecuted church has gone underground; and Shadowed: The Final Judgement. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House, 2005, in which God intervenes.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Spondulix: A Romance of Hoboken - Paul [Gerard] Di Filippo (b. 1954) (Cambrian Publications, 2003)
Eutopia and dystopia. Begins in the Amana colonies on the day of their becoming a joint stock company but has nothing else to say about the colonies. Family history from then into the near future. Future Hoboken is initially mildly dystopian and then is briefly partially transformed into a eutopia by the introduction of labor based money.
Keywords: Male author; US author

A State of Disobedience - Tom [Thomas P.] Kratman (b. 1956) (Baen, 2003)
Eutopia. Thinly disguised right-wing political tract. Includes a set of amendments to the U.S. Constitution including most of the goals of the U.S. far right.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Super Flat Time. Stories - Matthew Derby (Little Brown, 2003)
Dystopia. Linked stories about a period of violence and attempts to remember the past at stages of the future.
Parts previous published as “Home Recordings.” 3rd Bed, no. 2 (Spring-Summer 2000) http://calamaripress.com/3rdBed/3rd_Bed_Issues.htm. Accessed March 13, 2010; “Behavior Pilot.” Failbetter (Brooklyn, NY), no. 5 Posted February 18, 2002; http://failbetter.com/05/Behavior%20Pilot.htm. Accessed March 13, 2010; “Instructions.” 5 Trope, no. 13 (May 2002) http://webdelsol.com/5_trope/13/derby.htm. Accessed March 13, 2010; and “Sky Harvest.” Pindeldyboz 3 (Fall 2002): 1-6. “Joy of Eating.” Conjunctions; “The Father Helmet.” Fence; “The Boyish Mulatto.” American Journal of Print; and “Meat Tower.” Elimae (nd). http://www.elimae.com/fiction/derby/tower.html. Accessed March 13, 2010.
Keywords: Male author; US author

There Will Be Dragons - John Ringo (b. 1963) (Baen, 2003)
Technological eutopia in which all needs are met until the council controlling the technology starts warring against itself. Those who lived off the net provide the basis for rebuilding. Sequels include Emerald Sea. New York: Baen, 2004; Against the Tide. New York: Baen, 2005; and East of the Sun, West of the Moon. New York: Baen, 2006.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Tritcheon Hash - Sue Lange (Metropolis Ink, 2003)
All the women of Earth left and establish a new all-female society on another planet, with female and male babies exchanged annually with the men of Earth. The new society has been very successful, while the men have continued to fight and damage Earth. With the unacknowledged help of the women, the men of Earth begin to recover.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Twenty-First Century. A Novel - Bruce Schwartz (Park Avenue Press, 2003)
A terrorist attack leads to a new civil war in the US based on class and race. A central theme is the establishment of HOPE (With Housing and Opportunity comes Peace and Prosperity) Cities that were transforming the US ghettos into areas of opportunity; it was these twelve cities that were destroyed in the terrorist attack.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Under the Lunchbox Tree" - John [Joseph Vincent] Kessel (b. 1950) (Asimov’s Science Fiction, 2003)
Set in the same milieu as 2000 and 2002 Kessel. A brief story of a girl growing up in the Society of Cousins. See also 2006 and 2017 Kessel for other works about the Society of Cousins The lunchbox tree is an image in L. Frank Baum’s (1856-1919) Ozma of Oz. Chicago, Reilly & Britton, 1907.
Rpt. in his The Baum Plan for Financial Independence and Other Stories (Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2008), 164-76.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Urinetown. The Musical" - Greg Kotis (Faber and Faber, 2003)
Dystopia in which all facilities for peeing are controlled by a large corporation in order to limit the use of water. The corporation kills those peeing outside their facilities. A revolt is successful but water begins to quickly run out.
Selections from the score were published as Urinetown. The Musical. Milwaukee, WI: Hal Leonard, 2001.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Uterus Garden" - Alex[ander Christian] Irvine (b. 1969) (Polyphony, 2003)
Problems in a largely dystopian future in which most people are infertile.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Walking Contradiction" - Nancy Jane Moore (Imaginings: An Anthology of Long Short Fiction, 2003)
Future in which there are a wide range of genders available at choice. The story is written from the point of view of an "Ambi" or hermaphrodite in conflict with a cult that neuters people.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Wellstone - Wil[lliam Terence] McCarthy (b. 1966) (Bantam Books, 2003)
Immortality and the problems it poses for the younger generation. Sequel to 2000 McCarthy. The third and fourth volumes in the series, Lost in Transmission (New York: Random House, 2004) and To Crush the Moon: Being the Final Volume in the History of the Queendom of Sol (New York: Random House, 2005) record the disintegration of any hope of a good life as the problems of immortality grow.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The X President - Philip E[dward] E[dward] Baruth (b. 1962) (Bantam Books, 2003)
Set in 2055 and various dates in the past. An ex-President, known as B[ill] C[linton], is 109. History is revised to avoid the dystopia and the war between the right and the U.S. government that has developed.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Adventures of Lucky Pierre. Director; Cut - Robert [Lowell] Coover (b. 1932) (Grove Press, 2002)
A dystopia depicting the life of a male porn star from the points of view of his nine female directors. His, and everyone else's, reality is infinitely malleable.
Keywords: Male author; US author

“The Albertine Notes” - Rick [Hiram Frederick] Moody [ III] (b. 1961) (McSweeney’s Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales, 2002)
The dystopia brought about by a drug that brings back memories, good and bad, that was introduced after a major disaster meant that many people wanted to retrieve good memories.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The American Praetorians. A Novel - Dennis C[arroll] Purdy (b. 1952) (Trafford, 2002)
A dystopia imposed on the U.S. by liberal policies, which include very high taxes, elimination of freedoms enumerated in the Constitution, and a weakened military, results in a new American revolution. The Praetorians motto is “A man who saves a nation, commits no crime.”
Keywords: Male author; US author

Among the Betrayed - Margaret Peterson Haddix (b. 1964) (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2002)
Young adult overpopulation dystopia in which each family is limited to two children. Sequel to 1998 and 2001 Haddix. See also 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006 Haddix. In this volume, a third child is arrested by the Population Police and forced to spy on the other Shadow Children.
U.K. ed. London: Red Fox, 2002.
Keywords: Female author; US author

"Aristotle's Lantern" - Kim Edwards (b. 1958) (Zoetrope: All-Story, 2002)
Eutopian community established in the South China Sea and the conflicts that arise in trying to make it work.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Best That Money Can't Buy: Beyond Politics, Poverty & War - Jacque Fresco (1916-2017) (Global Cyber-Visions, 2002)
Detailed eutopia in essay form based around the Venus Project. See also 1969 Keyes and Fresco, 1995, 2002, and 2007 Fresco, and https://www.thevenusproject.com/the-venus-project/jacque-fresco/. PSt holds a folder that contains: Venus Project brochure (4 pp); 2 copies of highlights of an interview with Jacque Fresco (6 pp); photocopy of an article by the author entitled “Designing the Future: A Cybernetic City for the Next Century” published in The Futurist 28.3 (May-June 1994): 29-33; promotional materials including a color sheet with images of the model home and a color sheet with various conceptual renderings. At the University of Pennsylvania, the Daniels Millennium Collection, Box 329, includes a copy of the book, “Introduction to the Venus Project” (http://www.nas.com/venus/intro.shtml), “The Venus Project Mission Statement: (http://www.nas.com/venus/ms01.shtml), and other material. There is considerable repetition in the Fresco material.
6th ed. Venus, FL: Global Cyber-Visions, 2013. 8th ed. Venus, FL: Global Cyber-Visions, 2018.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Big Rock Candy Mountain" - Andy [Andrew Robert] Duncan (b. 1964) (The New Wave Fabulists, 2002)
Story based on the song "The Big Rock Candy Mountains" apparently written by Harry K. McClintock (Haywire Mac) around 1905 based on earlier oral sources. The song is generally identified with the depression of the 1930s when it became popular. The story uses the basic motif of the song of a hobos paradise contrasted to the world outside.
Rpt. in his The Pottawatomie Ghost and Other Stories (Hornsea, Eng.: PS Publishing, 2012), 41-62, with an author's story note on 309-10; and in his An Agent of Utopia: New & Selected Stories (Easthampton, MA: Small Beer Press, 2018), 141-65.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Bike Tour" - Richard Register (b. 1943) (Ecocities: Building Cities in Balance With Nature, 2002)
A tour of a eutopian ecocity set a hundred years in the future. No cars, hence the tour by bicycle. Neighborhoods surrounding a central city. To get from the neighborhood to the city center, there is a bike and foot trail and a separate two lane, mostly underground, route for the few vehicles that are used. Buildings have plantings. Bridges between buildings, with some for both bikes and pedestrians and some just for pedestrians. Varied architecture with buildings linked by bridges, windmills, and solar collectors. Mentions ramps for handicapped. Neighborhood police stations throughout the city. Small businesses flourish. Ambulances are gurneys pushed by paramedics on roller skates.
2nd ed. with additional illus. and minor textual differences as Ecocities: Rebuilding Cities in Balance with Nature. Illus. by the Author (Gabriola Island, BC, Canada: New Society Publishers, 2006), 184-92.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Burning Bombing of America" - Kathy [Karen Lehmann] Acker (1948-97) (Rip-off Red, Girl Detective and The Burning Bombing of America: The Destruction of the U.S., 2002)
Dystopia with America destroyed.
Keywords: Female author; US author

Coyote: A Novel of Interstellar Exploration - Allen M[ulherin] Steele [Jr.] (b. 1958) (Ace Books, 2002)
The novel begins on an authoritarian dystopia on Earth and ends with a group of libertarian rebels settling a new planet. See also 2004 and 2005 Steele. His Spindrift. New York: Ace Books, 2007. U.K. ed. London: Orbit, 2007 is a first contact novel that uses the setting of the Coyote novels, and his Galaxy Blues. New York: Ace Books, 2008 is set in the same universe. Three novels that relate to and continue aspects of Coyote history are Coyote Horizon: A Novel of Interstellar Discovery. New York: Ace Books, 2009; part originally published as “Walking Star.” Forbidden Planets. Ed. Marvin Kaye (New York: Science Fiction Book Club, 2006), 49-98; Coyote Destiny: A Novel of Interstellar Discovery. New York: Ace Books, 2010; and Hex. New York: Ace Books, 2011. A related story is “Tagging Bruno.” Asimov’s Science Fiction 41 1 & 2 (492 & 493) (January-February 2017): 28-47.
Originally published in different versions as "Stealing Alabama." Asimov's Science Fiction 25.1 (300) (January 2001): 86-130; "The Days Between." Asimov's Science Fiction 25.3 (302) (March 2001): 14-34; "Coming to Coyote." Asimov's Science Fiction 25.7 (306) (July 2001): 92-135; Liberty Journals." Asimov's Science Fiction 25,10 & 11 (309 & 310) (October/November 2001): 128-42; "The Boid Hunt." Star Colonies. Ed. Martin Greenberg and John Helfers (New York: DAW Books, 2000), 70-94; "Across the Eastern Divide." Asimov's Science Fiction (February 2002); "Lonesome and a Long Way Home." Asimov's Science Fiction 26.6 (317) (June 2002): 76-96; and "Glorious Destiny." Asimov's Science Fiction 26.12 (323) (December 2002): 92-131. Copyright page notes that this story is completely unaltered.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Cricket on the Hearth" - Ray[mond Douglas] Bradbury (1920-2012) (One More for the Road, 2002)
Dystopia of government spying.
Rpt. in his Match to Flame: The Fictional Paths to Fahrenheit 451. Ed. Donn Albright, Donn and Jon[athan R.] Eller, Textual Ed. (Colorado Springs, CO: Gauntlet Press, 2006), 219-48; and in his A Pleasure to Burn: Fahrenheit 451 Stories (Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2010) 111-20.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Daughters of an Amber Moon - Katherine [V.] Forrest (b. 1939) (Alyson Books, 2002)
Sequel to 1984 Forrest. This volume concerns the women who chose to stay on Earth and their struggle to survive in the face of the dystopia that is the Earth. At the end of the novel, some of the women from the new planet return to Earth, which is converted from a dystopia to a eutopia. See also 2005 Forrest.
Keywords: Canadian author; US author

Design Your Own Utopia - Chaz [Charles] Bufe; [Elizabeth known as Libby] [Hubbard] (b. 1956) (See Sharp Press, 2002)
Mostly a lengthy questionnaire intended to assist people thinking about utopia but includes short descriptions of a local eutopia or intentional community and a global eutopia. See also 1988 and 1994 Hubbard; and 2012 Bufe and Hubbard.
The text can also be found at http://www.seesharppress.com/utopia.html.
Keywords: Female author; Male author; US author

"The Dystopianist, Thinking of His Rival, Is Interrupted by a Knock on the Door" - Jonathan [Allen] Lethem (b. 1964) (The New Wave Fabulists, 2002)
Satire on utopias and dystopias.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Ersatz Nation - Tim Kenyon (Big Engine, 2002)
Authoritarian dystopia set in a parallel world. Successful revolt.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Feed - M[atthew] T[obin] Anderson (b. 1964) (Candlewick Press, 2002)
Young adult dystopia in which everyone is controlled by a transmitter implanted in their brain.
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Golden Age - John C[harles] Wright (b. 1961) (Tor, 2002)
Future interplanetary flawed utopia; the utopia is not what it appears to be in that it suppresses dissent. First volume of The Golden Age trilogy. The trilogy concerns the original utopia, a rebel against it, and the temporary merging of all sentient life into a supermind. See also 2003 Wright (2). Elements of space opera.
Keywords: US author

Green Boy - Susan [Mary] Cooper (b. 1935) (Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2002)
Young adult novel with children shifting between two worlds, the present and a polluted, overpopulated dystopia. Environmental concerns.
UK ed. London: Bodley Head, 2002.
Keywords: English author; Female author; US author

Growing Young: An Old Man Who Suddenly Becomes Young Must Help the World Accept an Age Cure - Dean Warren (Xlibris, 2002)
The title is a good summary. When a cure is found for aging, and a newly young man works to avoid the overpopulation dystopia that could result. The ending of the novel implies a sequel, but none has been published.
Keywords: Male author; US author

Hammer Town - Selina Rosen (b. 1960) (Yard Dog Press, 2002)
Corporate authoritarian dystopia.
Keywords: Female author; US author

The Impossible Bird - Patrick O'Leary (b. 1952) (Tor, 2002)
Flawed utopia. Perfection provided by aliens is found to lack the emotional connection humans need.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"The Invisible Empire" - John [Joseph Vincent] Kessel (b. 1950) (The New Wave Fabulists, 2002)
Dystopia in which an organization of women kill men who abuse women.
Keywords: Male author; US author

"Its Hour Cometh" - James Van Pelt (b. 1954) (Talebones, 2002)
Dystopia describing future prisoner "rehabilitation".
Keywords: Male author; US author

The Kanshou - Sally Miller Gearhart (1931-2021) (Spinsters Ink Books, 2002)
Future history including a chronology, a glossary, and the details of a Global Government. All animals died and women take power. The Kanshou are the women warriors who keep the peace. The first volume of the Earthkeep books that includes 2003 Gearhart. A third volume, The Steward, was announced but disappeared from the author’s website. The author’s best-known book is The Wanderground: Stories of the Hill Women, 1978. The female author was a gay rights activist and a Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at San Francisco State University. Her papers are held at the University of Oregon.
Keywords: Female author; US author