Fools

Author: Pat Cadigan

Cyberpunk, despite its interest in body modifications and computer interfaces, was never really concerned with the posthuman. But occasionally a cyberpunk work would start probing towards the posthuman, raising issues that clearly pointed in that direction. One such was Fools. It is set in a world in which memories can be bought and sold, and hence what goes on in the mind is separated from the body. This obviously raises key questions about the nature of identity and what it is that makes us human, and it is this that makes Fools a harbinger of the posthuman. When one character starts to play host to memories that are not her own, she finds herself at war within herself. Why itâ€™s on the list: Fools won Cadiganâ€™s second Arthur C. Clarke Award. Itâ€™s a novel in which the digitising of the mind, the fluidity of memory, open the way for the sort of digitised future that has become one of the common features of posthuman sf.