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| Omega via LiveLib |
A forerunner of the genre, Omega, by veteran sci-fi/fantasy writer Andrei Valentinov, came out in 2005, shortly after Ukraine’s pro-Western Orange Revolution. It depicted three alternate-history versions of 2004, one of them a dystopia in which Crimea had been invaded and occupied by NATO forces in 1995; while the main characters were resistance fighters, they were both anti-Moscow and anti-NATO. (Valentinov, a Russian-speaking Ukrainian whose real name is Andrei Shmalko and who lives in Kharkiv, one of Eastern Ukraine’s major cities, has professed equal distaste for “Russian chauvinists,” “Ukrainian nationalists,” and “American globalists”; more recently, he has strongly affirmed his loyalty to Ukraine.)I've never read any of the novels mentioned, so can't speak to their quality. The article is an interesting example though of how sci-fi is often reflective of a society's fears. Claims to be predictive often strike me as overblown when applied to sci-fi novels with superficial similarities to current events, but in this case they may well be applicable to at least some of the novels mentioned.
ᔥ Gerry Canavan
