David Louis Edelman, and Infoquake, have shown up on the Italian website Fantascienza.com, in a piece which, as far as I can tell, quotes Edelman’s earlier interview on Sci Fi Wire. Now, I don’t read Italian, but I do know how to call up Babel Fish, that wonderful web service that owes it’s name to Douglas Adams but reminds me of nothing more than the opening chapters of Philip K. Dick’s Galactic Pot Healer, in which bored employees in three countries push famous quotes thru translation software and back again, then play guessing games as to what the original text is.
Thus, in the spirit of PKD, who, I believe, would have appreciated Infoquake, I present these wonderful excerpts from the Babel Fish translation:
“We speak instead of Infoquake, novel of debut of trentacinquenne the American David Louis Edelman, programmatore, web designer, journalist and now also ski fi writer (operates its, between the others, the situated one web of the U.S. Army), which it seems to have inaugurated a new fantascientifico kind that same it defines one via of means between Dunes and the Wall ßstreet Journal. Interviewed from Ski Fi Wire, Edelman has delineated the weft of the book centralized on the figure of Natch, a businessman pitiless and lacking in scrupoli whose scope consists in launch on the market one new technology of which it ignores the real essence, potentially dangerous.”
And, my favorite, this piece contrasting Infoquake and it’s forthcoming sequel:
“While in Infoquake the action regards mainly the part, so to speak, mercantilistica of the matter, with taken care of descriptions of the tactics of sale and all the dirty ones makes up that they put in field the speculators without scrupoli, in Multi-Real the vicissitude takes a fold more political, even if the pure action does not lack in both cases, guarantees Edelman. Insomma, after the fantapolitica, the fantathriller, the fantaeconomia, the fantastoria etc etc, is the turn of the fantabusiness. “
Who couldn’t be for that! Thank you Babel Fish and thank you, most importantly, Fantascienza, for helping spread the word.
Update: While we’re on the subject, Paul Cornell – he of Doctor Who novel, audiobook & television fame – has just selected Infoquake as his favorite SF novel of the year. As he describes on his blog, the House of Awkwardness:
“My favourite SF novel of the year. A future of business and competition that we can all identify with, which neatly avoids apocalyptic cliché, and thus the adoration of the British SF critics. I’ve blogged about it before, otherwise I’d say more. And hey, catchphrases you can use online: towards perfection!”