Bookworm: All Tomorrows
Speculative human evolution — a subject that was rising in popularity in the past few weeks, namely through the public’s sudden interest in this very book with the help of the internet. What will us Homo sapiens in the future look like? How are our descendants going to interact with one another? What are we? These are the questions asked by the book. Prepare to be disappointed (in a good way, though), for the answers are surprisingly primitive, aside from a physiological sense. In this book you will experience the new dawn of mankind, started from the colonisation of the green Mars. The era is of course followed by interplanetary conflict, which led to an emerging golden age, when the flourishing ‘star people’ began hopping from one planet to another, in a grand campaign of expansion and conquest.
Like all good stories, there has got to be someone to screw it up. The great galactic empire of man struck by an alien superpower, known as the ‘Qu’. These psychotic beings subjugated the human empire. Worse, they twisted humans, and their genetic make-ups, into lowly creatures so nightmarish that they are unrecognisable as a human being. Then just like that, the aliens left the scene. What was left of the mishap was the stunted minds and bodies of these primitive critters. Each beast occupies their own worlds, though the latter is not always forgiving. It will be long before these different beings rediscover their past sentience. In between the present and over a billion years after, empires will rise and fall. The disfigured species of future men journeys into the stars and the stairs of evolution. And new enemies will always disturb the temporary peace.
Fair to say that I am also fascinated by its outlandish premise, and decided that this book is too weird to be left alone. All Tomorrows is a dark, yet awesome science fiction written by a strange human creature from the far far future, Nemo Ramjet. Well not really, actually it was written by C. M. Kosemen. Now I am not familiar with any Turkish authors but if there is one which I can say is my favourite, it will be this man. Still, the idea of some weird human-alien-person writing a book is quite novel. The chronicle was written in 2006. However, due to the recent trend, people from all over are now quoting the book, and the entire thing gave birth to countless memes.
The book reads like a historical note, divided into passages each describing an event or a story, as well as the creatures itself. These chapters are short, simple, and to the point. Its straightforward nature leaves little details and instead focuses more on the big picture of each event or the creatures’ biology. Paired with the beautiful cinematic-like and disturbing imagery also drawn by the author, this book is one of those books you can read over and over again. And you probably will, because one read is not enough to gawk at the otherworldly stories. Despite the book being a very short read, with just over 100 pages long, readers will find themselves immersed in its universe. In my case, I looked at my own hands, moving them around and thought “Man, this thing is insane… What the hell are we?”
On a cosmological scale, Homo sapiens’ era has been relatively tiny. Nature was just doing its own thing for millions of years. We might think of ourselves as a final product. But what if we are only transitory, the ancestor of the currently unknown species? All Tomorrows explores just that. Although keep in mind that the book contains barely any scientific claims, other than the mentions of evolution. The changes in which the ‘star people’ underwent came mostly from an external intervention — the alien Qu. Therefore, the book is fully science fiction. No matter how exciting it is to read, it is of course not a substitute for actual scientific speculative evolution.
Honestly, the images alone make this book worth checking out. I (very) highly recommend this book. It is very enjoyable to read, easy to follow, and would not take much of your time. The latter could be a negative or a positive thing. To me personally, I wish that the book could be longer, as I feel like some events could be more detailed. The grim and terrifying tale did not distract me from having fun. In fact, it adds to the experience. Though I guess all that is somewhat subjective. Those of us that are so comfortable with our own modern sapiens way of life may think that the life of a worm man or a pterodactyl person is scary. But hey! They could be living the life, who knows. Millions of years of being that way leaves you out of options, right?
Lastly, the book can be read for free! The link can be found below:
Oleh: Anindito Wisaksono
