Solution Three ([Dobson science fiction]) [Hardcover]

Two centuries in the future, humankind and its world are almost unrecognizable, a Utopia in progress. After an apocalyptic period in which most cities and food-producing regions were ravaged, the essential dangers facing the race were identified as overpopulation and aggression. Soon, three Solutions were set in place, one after the other. These Solutions were (if I've got this right): the stigmatization of heterosexuality to combat overpopulation, the apportioning to everyone of rather small "reasonably equal living spaces" to eliminate envy and possessiveness, and finally the replacing of ordinary childbirth with homosexual mothers giving birth to "perfect" clone children who would then be taken from the mothers as toddlers, around the age of two, and raised by the State.

As Mitchison notes in the introduction, her emphasis here is with a biological science fiction and not with the sci-fi of physics. So this is hard sci-fi, but heavy on social situations . . . and none of that fun spectacle-oriented aliens-n-spacecraft stuff. Over the course of the novel, a parallel develops between crises in social engineering and agricultural engineering. Something unexpected and frightening is happening with the genetically tampered-with food supply, and something similar may be afflicting the clones.

In the end, the novel illuminates the growing and disturbing superstitious belief in scientific progress as something that will outpace its own horrendous destructive effects, as something that will--in the words of Wendell Berry--accomplish a "long end run that will carry us and the environment over the goal line of survival." This belief is not merely hope; it is faith.

In terms of literary merit, there is some similarity here to Brave New World (Aldous Huxley was a childhood friend of Mitchison's); however, I found Mitchison's characters far more convincing and lifelike than Huxley's. She also demonstrates a deft hand with fluid viewpoint technique and concise narrative structuring (this ambitious book runs to just 160 pages). If I have one complaint with the novel, it's that we're left wondering: did they really solve anything, and just how big of a mess are these people left with? A similar novel, which perhaps takes things a bit further (and with a fair amount of black humor) is Anthony Burgess's The Wanting Seed, published 13 years earlier--another problematic-Utopia novel not to be missed.

Doing a little background search, I found that Naomi Mitchison led quite a life. She was an activist for women's rights in Britain (indeed, my edition of Solution Three was published by the Feminist Press), married a Labour politician who became a Life Peer, wrote some 90 book . . . . Oh, and in the collected letters of JRR Tolkien we find a substantial correspondence between Mitchison and himself as well as notice that she was a proofreader for The Lord of the Rings.

A final note: the Feminist Press edition of the novel has a long afterword with some great information on Mitchision, but it also judges the engineered Utopia of the novel in too positive a light when, after all, the author herself labeled it a "horrid idea" in her dedication.

This is an odd little book. It's science fiction for a start, which is a bit of a departure for Mitchison. The story is based on the twin ideas that the world's population has got too big and needs reduced, and the cause of most aggression is the power imbalance and friction in heterosexual relationships. The solution referred to in the title is to condition and coerce people into same sex relationships and replace natural birth with planned cloning. There is a plan to repopulate the world with clones of two archetypes considered more worthy than the rest of humanity, which will result in the solving of all the world's problems.

The world Mitchison's character's inhabit is one of tightly populated cities where people live in cupboard size spaces and all food is synthesised or otherwise scientifically grown. Living space, access to culture, decisions about children, job choices, all are controlled and decided for people. Life is considered good, but some people question, there is always the news of some sort of vague trouble happening in some far away land and the perfectly hybridized plants that feed the world are beginning to fail. This is not an unusual concept in sci-fi but Mitchison's imagined future is more insidious than most. The people in charge exert their authority by "caring" not by the gun. It's a world of stifling "reasonable" argument; they talk things out, rather than shoot people or throw them in jail. The prevailing solution has become so ingrained people are trapped by their own fears of non-conformance; the state no longer needs to do much more.

Mitchison seems to be enjoying herself with this book. There is humour in the depiction of the archetype, who are based on a sort of stereotype of the liberal left in the 1970s, right down to the cannabis smoking and the open necked flannel shirt all their clones wear. She plays with the understanding of sexual norms; the few remaining heterosexual couples live a life of self doubt about their deviant choices. And there is doubt in everything the characters do. This is after all the third attempt at the solution.

Her writing style is as always very readable. I've yet to read one of her works that doesn't draw the reader along fairly effortlessly. If you are a fan of Mitchison this is worth a read, you'll probably enjoy it. If you are a fan of sci-fi this will probably interest you too. It's not her best work, but an interesting, and fun, read.