SF story ending: old character recalling their life since the present
March 4, 2020 2:43 PM Subscribe
I have a (possibly false) memory of an SF story set in the future, in which a final/penultimate chapter is told in the first person, by a key character who is revealed to be from our own time. In my head that chapter starts "I was born in [year], in [city]", with the year sometime in the latter 20th or maybe early 21st century. The chapter is them retelling their life from our time up until the period of the story, and expands on aspects of the worldbuilding previously only hinted at. What am I thinking of?
Either it's near future and the character is old, or it's further in the future and they're displaced in time / have had an extended lifetime somehow.
If my memory is real, it would most likely be an 80s to early 00s book. My best guess had been Ken MacLeod's The Sky Road, but I've just picked that up to check, and although there's a character who fits, there's no chapter like this.
I feel like I may be imagining this, but I still want to scratch this itch, so I'd be interested in any stories that have something like this trope, even if they don't quite match my description.
Either it's near future and the character is old, or it's further in the future and they're displaced in time / have had an extended lifetime somehow.
If my memory is real, it would most likely be an 80s to early 00s book. My best guess had been Ken MacLeod's The Sky Road, but I've just picked that up to check, and although there's a character who fits, there's no chapter like this.
I feel like I may be imagining this, but I still want to scratch this itch, so I'd be interested in any stories that have something like this trope, even if they don't quite match my description.
This isn't it, but your question reminded me of my favorite storyline from Warren Ellis's Transmetropolitan series, about the sad, lonely experience of a cryogenic "revival" in the far future: Another Cold Morning
posted by Rhaomi at 3:39 PM on March 4, 2020 [4 favorites]
posted by Rhaomi at 3:39 PM on March 4, 2020 [4 favorites]
Could it be YA? The City of Ember book starts this way and ends with a letter or diary written (in the first person) hundreds of years earlier by someone preparing for the events in the book.
posted by Mchelly at 4:06 PM on March 4, 2020
posted by Mchelly at 4:06 PM on March 4, 2020
Is it The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect, by mefi's own localroger, readable online here?
It features a protagonist born in the present who lives into the very distant future, and the final chapter reframes the events leading up to the end of the book in a really interesting way.
posted by Black Cordelia at 4:24 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
It features a protagonist born in the present who lives into the very distant future, and the final chapter reframes the events leading up to the end of the book in a really interesting way.
posted by Black Cordelia at 4:24 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
Also not it, but reminds me of The Man from Earth (2007) - IMDb. A farewell party story turns into "my first memories were walking off the plains at the dawn of man." And He Never Died (2015) - IMDb with Henry Rollins no less.
I enjoy this type of story, I'll be checking out these answers.
posted by zengargoyle at 4:30 PM on March 4, 2020
I enjoy this type of story, I'll be checking out these answers.
posted by zengargoyle at 4:30 PM on March 4, 2020
OMG! I've read The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect, and thought it was just another random forgotten paperback. One of my favorites that I still remember most of the plot and have always wondered what book it was. Yay Ask for answering an unasked question.
posted by zengargoyle at 4:38 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by zengargoyle at 4:38 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Enough_for_Love
By Heinlein?
posted by Jacen at 4:45 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
By Heinlein?
posted by Jacen at 4:45 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
It's a common trope if loosely interpreted but not exactly as described, 'The Forever War' by Joe Haldeman is kinda like this..
posted by ovvl at 4:50 PM on March 4, 2020
posted by ovvl at 4:50 PM on March 4, 2020
Kaleidoscope Century by John Barnes?
It's a very, very nasty book if that reminds you. One of the few twenty first centuries worse than the so-called real one.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 5:07 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
It's a very, very nasty book if that reminds you. One of the few twenty first centuries worse than the so-called real one.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 5:07 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]
Any chance at all it's Cloud Atlas?
posted by praemunire at 6:48 PM on March 4, 2020
posted by praemunire at 6:48 PM on March 4, 2020
Or The Bone Clocks (another David Mitchell), but I kind of doubt it.
posted by verbminx at 9:51 PM on March 4, 2020
posted by verbminx at 9:51 PM on March 4, 2020
Response by poster: Thanks all. None of these ideas has made me exclaim "oh yes that was it!", but I've got some things to read now, so thank you to everyone. I did hang out on kuro5hin back in the day, so localroger's story is a possibility, zengargoyle - I'll go have a read of that first. And thanks to Rhaomi for reminding me of that bit from Transmetropolitan, which I read back when it came out.
I am leaning towards thinking that I have conflated my idea of this chapter from different sources.
I remembered a specific feeling, of reading a story that hints at a connection, then later suddenly explodes into familiarity. It has just hit me that the feeling I'm thinking of happened reading Iain Banks' The Bridge -- there's a point where our glimpses of the protagonist's backstory finally break through into a longer, lucid account that was very satisfying after all the confusion and hints of the preceding chapters.
And then being a mostly-SF reader, I think I probably muddled up that feeling with an SF trope, misconnected Scottish SF authors and thought of MacLeod's books, and then probably imagined those opening words entirely.
But I could be wrong - I will keep looking.
posted by automatronic at 4:51 AM on March 7, 2020
I am leaning towards thinking that I have conflated my idea of this chapter from different sources.
I remembered a specific feeling, of reading a story that hints at a connection, then later suddenly explodes into familiarity. It has just hit me that the feeling I'm thinking of happened reading Iain Banks' The Bridge -- there's a point where our glimpses of the protagonist's backstory finally break through into a longer, lucid account that was very satisfying after all the confusion and hints of the preceding chapters.
And then being a mostly-SF reader, I think I probably muddled up that feeling with an SF trope, misconnected Scottish SF authors and thought of MacLeod's books, and then probably imagined those opening words entirely.
But I could be wrong - I will keep looking.
posted by automatronic at 4:51 AM on March 7, 2020
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posted by zoetrope at 2:57 PM on March 4, 2020