The Fortunate Fall (novel)

The Fortunate Fall is the debut and only novel by Raphael Carter, published by Tor
The Fortunate Fall
Books in 1996. The title comes from the Christian theological concept of felix culpa.

Contents
Plot summary
Themes and significance
Awards
See also
References
External links

Plot summary
The protagonist is Maya Andreyeva, a "camera" for a major news network in a 24th-
Tor cover by Bruce Jensen
century after the fall of a US world empire, where every nation is a third-rate power
except hypertechnological Africa, which requires a blood test of aspiring
Author Raphael Carter
immigrants. Cover artist Bruce Jensen
Country United States
As a "camera", Maya is heavily wired with sensory and telecommunications gear so
that she can broadcast her perceptions, combining the functions of an on-location Genre postcyberpunk
reporter and her camera crew, presenting both audiovisual data and its interpretation. science fiction novel
(Related concepts include simstim in William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy, or the Publisher Tor Books
"gargoyles" of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash.) Publication July 1996 to April
date 1997
Carter uses the protagonist's occupation as a focal point for analyzing the role of the
media in packaging, selling, and, thus shaping history and historical truth. The Media type Print (Hardcover &
reader is taken through not only the familiar slanted research and writing of a piece, trade paperback)
but also the careful cooking of raw sense data for broadcast by a screener, the one Pages 288
person who experiences the camera's full sense experience, precisely so that others ISBN 0-312-86034-X
do not. The screeners experience high turnover because of their unfortunate
tendency to identify too closely, and fall in love, with the cameras who cannot share their unidirectional intimacy. The novel begins
with Maya finding herself saddled with a new and problematic screener - one who appears to her only through the net, never in
person, and who is a woman, contrary to all custom in herheterocentric dystopia.

In the virtual company of this mysterious woman, Maya grapples with conspiracy, totalitarianism, mind control, race, sexuality, as
well as the nature of the mind and free will.

Themes and significance

The novel plays with a number of literary themes and elements, but can be broadly categorized as "postcyberpunk", i.e. science
fiction dealing with the consequences of a drastically computerized and networked society, however with much more direct
experience with IT and without thematic limitations of first-wavecyberpunk.[1]
The novel "mixes broad themes like homophobia, censorship and government surveillance with the shared intimacies and
vulnerabilities of individuals who live outside the boundaries accepted by society"[2] and "explores the relationship between man and
machine in an increasingly wired world."[2]

Awards
The Fortunate Fall was well received. Noted in one review as "a superb example of speculative fiction,"[2] the book was included in
the Locus recommended reading list and nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel. It was 4th in the Locus Award among first
novels and led to Carter's nomination for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 1997 and 1998. In her 2010
retrospective review, writer and critic Jo Walton described it as "certainly one of the most important books of the last twenty
years."[3]

See also
Cyberpunk
Lesbian science fiction

References
1. Lawrence Person's 1998 Notes Toward a Postcyberpunk Manifesto(http://slashdot.org/features/99/10/08/2123255.s
html) started to define the subgenre, and listedThe Fortunate Fall as 10th of 13 particular examples.
2. Hilchey, Tim (1996-09-22). "The Fortunate Fall" (https://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/22/books/books-in-brief-fiction-40
6503.html). New York Times. Retrieved 2011-04-11.
3. Walton, Jo (2010-01-06)." "Locked in our separate skulls": Raphael Carter'sThe Fortunate Fall" (http://www.tor.com/
blogs/2010/01/qlocked-in-our-separate-skullsq-raphael-carters-lemgthe-fortunate-falllemg)
. Tor.com. Retrieved
2013-05-15.

External links
The Fortunate Fall title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
Review of The Fortunate Fall by Jo Walton
Patrick and Teresa Nielsen Hayden: "Anatomy of a Sale: Raphael Carter'sThe Fortunate Fall to Tor Books." In The
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writer's Sourcebook , 2nd ed., ed. David Borcherding. Cincinnati: W
riter's Digest Press,
1996. ISBN 0-89879-762-4

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