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Book Review – The Kitchener Waterloo Record

TheRecord.com: 2020 Hindsight

Reviewed by Jon Fear January 27, 2012

2020 Hindsight: The Year in Preview, by F.C. (Fred) Dawkins (Self-published, 354 pages, $19.95 sof

 Fred Dawkins of Guelph has written a clever and entertaining novel that looks just a few years into the future and plays with a few big “what ifs” that probably won’t seem so far-fetched to anyone with half an imagination who has been following the global political and economic scene in recent months. First of all imagine that stem cell research has produced a way to stop humans from aging. And then imagine that the major Western governments, including those of the United States and Canada, have all but collapsed. Private militias control different regions and major cities such as Chicago, Toronto and Detroit are considered beyond recovery. One remaining source of power and influence in North America is the Mormon church, but another power centre is emerging at a community in the southwest called Nirodha that is protected by a private military force. Selected elites are moving there because Nirodha is home to the world’s only Extended Life Program. The thread that holds this fantasy together is the Wallace family. Dr. Gerry Wallace is the brains behind the program. Alarmed that the program’s goals are being subverted for political ends, his brother and other family members want to make the doctor see what’s happening. But even getting to Nirodha is a huge challenge.  

Dawkins holds an MA in Economics and has a website at www.fcdawkins.com. This is his first novel. 

This article is for personal use only courtesy of TheRecord.com – a division of Metroland Media Group Ltd.

 

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