A book a day: Edmundo Paz Soldán: The path of the future

Year of publication: 2021
Valuation: Advisable

It is no secret, at least for those of you who follow this blog with some frequency, that Edmundo Paz Soldán is one of my favorite authors of the moment. I think that I have already read 10 books, including this one “La vía del futuro”, by the author born in Cochabamba. Although his work is much broader, I think I am not mistaken if I say that there are two main lines, both firmly anchored in reality, that can be distinguished in it: the “purely realistic” and the “fantastic”.

The book we bring to ULAD today would be framed, like “Iris” or “Las visiones”, in that second line that we have called “fantastic”. Because the three works start from premises linked to science fiction to talk about realities and situations that are very identifiable for readers. That is to say, no escapist science fiction or “easy consumption” (absolutely legitimate, on the other hand) but stories that, despite being populated by algorithms, holograms and virtual realities, talk about the here and now, about this world we inhabit. I don’t know about you, but for me all this sounds a bit like Black Mirror (although it is too obvious a reference).

Thus, the 8 stories that make up “The Way of the Future” talk about relationships, power relations (political, economic, religious…), the use of technologies and our relationship with them, social control, drug use, etc.

For me, God is GPS – Olmos answers – A machine that tells you the best path to follow, never fails you and is on 24 hours a day. What other God do you want?

Overall, I rate the book as “recommended” due to a certain irregularity between the different texts. And although some (“My Dear Shining”, “The Astronaut Michael Garcia” or “In the Hour of Our Death”) have left me rather cold and I have not managed to connect with them, others are truly magnificent. I would highlight the following:

• “The Skulls”, a story that plays with the real/virtual life dichotomy to talk about insecurities in relationships,
• “The Japanese Doll”, a tragicomic story that narrates a particular descent into hell and in which the question of whether we are the ones who dominate technology or is it rather the other way around, is raised, among other issues.
• “The Lord of the Palm”, perhaps the most political story in the volume, is nothing other than a critique of those new forms of faith that hide the wildest capitalism under terms such as entrepreneurship or self-made.

A little further into no man’s land are “The Way of the Future” and “Welcome to the New World”, stories that open and close the volume. They are more than acceptable stories, but in my opinion they are below the previous ones.

In short, an interesting, though somewhat irregular, collection of stories by an author whom one can trust almost blindly, at least according to what I have read so far. And that is saying something!