Love Minus Eighty

April 15, 2013
Building his Hugo-winning short story “Bridesicle” into a novel, McIntosh (Hitchers) takes a cold-eyed look at relationships in a grim future. Navigating around Manhattan’s floating upper-class enclave, High Town, his characters struggle with age-old questions of finding the perfect mate, complicated by new technology that records every action and that will soon record every feeling. At the center of the story lie the “bridesicles,” women of above-average looks and below-average health insurance, preserved from death for the possibility of indentured marriage to wealthy suitors. Mira Bach, the oldest, and Winter West, the newest, experience brief escapes from suspension in “the minus eighty” whenever someone is interested. Around them, protests spark and the guilt-ridden man who killed Winter recruits others to the cause of freeing the frozen. McIntosh layers on the irony, with dating coaches who struggle to find love and an empathy researcher who has a difficult time expressing emotion. It’s not clear why insurance covers freezing for centuries but not restoration, and the plot relies heavily on coincidence, but fans of “what if?” SF will enjoy this dystopian tale. Agent: Seth Fishman, the Gernert Company.

Starred review from May 1, 2013
Set approximately 100 years after McIntosh's previous work (Soft Apocalypse, 2011), this novel ponders the effect that a 24-hour virtual lifestyle and an almost psychotically appearance-focused culture can have on romance. Mira is a "bridesicle": For a steep fee, a man can temporarily revive her frozen, badly damaged (but still beautiful) corpse for a chat; if she can charm him sufficiently, he'll pay the far higher cost to fully restore her to life in exchange for her agreement to marry him. The trouble is, Mira is gay. After a very public breakup with Lorelei--who intends the drama to gain her more virtual followers--a despondent Rob accidentally runs over and kills Winter, a young schoolteacher out jogging. Desperate to apologize, he works long hours at a factory job so he can afford to visit her at the bridesicle facility and finds himself falling in love. And Veronika, a professional dating coach who feeds her clients clever, flirtatious lines to say during their dates, is seemingly incapable of forging her own deep emotional connections. This is speculative fiction at its most personal and powerful, extrapolating current social and technological trends and exploring how they would affect future people simply trying to live their lives and make their existence matter to someone. The author is perhaps too quick to dismiss the concept of "groomsicles" and the financial viability of same-sex cryogenic "dating," but apart from that, he offers an emotionally and sociologically genuine-seeming vision of the 22nd century. Intriguing, quirky, perversely charming and definitely affecting.

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May 15, 2013

In the 21st century, death is not necessarily permanent; if the victim is attractive enough to gain the attention of someone who can afford the costly revivification procedures, the frozen corpse (or "bridesicle") may choose a permanent marriage contract, exchanging his or her freedom for a second chance at life. When Rob accidentally kills a woman, he is so haunted by his action that he becomes one of her suitors, funded by an anonymous benefactor. His story catches the attention of a media and public hungry for vicarious experiences. Eventually the woman, known only as Winter, accepts a proposal, becoming the literal property of a man she comes to despise. As resistance to the ethics of bridesicles grows, Rob becomes part of a dangerous plan to change the world. VERDICT Based on his 2010 Hugo-winning short story "Bridesicle," McIntosh's (Hitchers; Soft Apocalpyse) latest novel combines sf future tech with horror to craft a story that is both disturbing and hopeful as it questions the value of a life on borrowed time. The dystopic view of the future is both frightening and plausible, while the characters keep the story grounded in the details of human existence.

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