Sixty Days and Counting

Whereas Vernor Vinge’s Rainbows End (reviewed below) presents a harsh, dark, and edgy world that is more virtual than real, Kim Stanley Robinson’s book, Sixty Days and Counting, is a story that is full of nature, nature writing, and natural philosophy, even though most of the story takes place in Washington DC.
Like Rainbows End, Sixty Days and Counting is an example of near-future science-based speculative fiction. The pacing is more leisurely, but then again, so is the pace of the Threat to Humanity that is depicted in this book: Global Warming (we frogs-in-warming-water still have a bit of time to reflect on this particular disaster—is it really getting warmer? Are we causing it? Can we afford to do anything about it? Can we not? We certainly need not mobilize the marines. But I digress.)
Whereas Vernor Vinge is a computer scientist and mathematician who seems to enjoy writing about such poet-laureates as his character Robert Gu, Mr. Robinson is an English PhD who seems to enjoy writing about scientists. This affinity seems to run deep for him: His other books are full of scientists as well, plus, he is married to a one.
Now to the story: Sixty Days and Counting is the third of Mr. Robinson’s Science-in-the-City series, a trilogy about the efforts of an earnest group of scientists and politicians to deflect the coming global disaster that is global warming. The old Washington-DC guard has been ousted, and a new president with high ideals has been elected. He and his team struggle to lead an international response to the crisis while Frank, a scientist at the National Science Foundation gives us excitement and intrigue in the form of a mysterious girl friend (their story begins in the first book of this trilogy) who is apparently involved in a conspiracy to throw the presidential election. Frank is drawn by his love/lust for this lady into a dangerous "black-op" mess; he is bugged, followed, and harassed by shady characters with sophisticated technology and government funding.
Frank is also the source of much that is beautiful about this book; his story (and this is why I really fell for this book) mixes in Buddhism via his interactions with the members of an Asian nation displaced by rising sea levels; and his own ruminations are the vehicle in which Mr. Robinson gives us an in-depth tour of the writings of Emerson and Thoreau and of their friendship with each other. Frank's fascination with these men belies Mr. Robinson's own love of Thoreau and Emerson, and it has spurred interest on my part as well. As a fun web-imitates-writing kind of we, Frank often accesses a website called emersonfortheday.com, a website that only came into actual existence when one of Mr. Robinson’s fans created it.
Though some may dismiss this book as just more doomsday writing, and therefore either too boring or too terrifying to read, the gentle treatment given by Mr. Robinson to the global-warming crisis through his characters, their relationships, and their philosophies make this book too enriching to pass up. Bring a copy with you to the hot tub!