Sex War One

Sex War One – my dystopian Sci-fi novel – is available for purchase in all eBooks & iBooks stores & devices. “Fast-moving plot and skillful characterization,” said the Science Fiction Studies journal. “This book unifies within it the principles of major Science-Fiction literature,” said This World. Kindle Edition: amazon.com/dp/B00OI8HGVQ Smashwords Edition: smashwords.com/books/view/484747 (for iTunes, Kobo, B&N & more.) For further details please check my books page

To give you a taste of the book, I’ve been posting segments of my award-winning short story, “The Monster,” which serves also as the basis for the book. Here then is the twelfth segment:

The purple light was blinking and she saw D.L.’s image reflected through the door. She touched the electronic distance-device that was in her hand and the door slid open soundlessly, allowing D.L. in. She stood up and, smiling wordlessly, pointed to the bed. He joined her there, as they both sat down on the bed. Between them an extended plastic arm held a tray prepared with a meal. The food was a combination of liquid and solid, mostly made of vitamin-enriched chemical-solutions. It was prepared by the Kitchen-Department unit and at the adjacent Food-Laboratory, where all the food supplies in this underground colony were made. Choices were limited, though there were different meal-combination options available for the citizens. S.O. knew them well, and therefore had ordered a satisfying, if light and scentless meal.
They ate quietly, not accustomed to pleasantries or small talk. S.O. realized that D.L. was preoccupied with the events of the colony-day, and probably with his visit to Z.Z. as well, so she avoided pressuring him with undue questions. She touched again her small distance-device and switched off the Common-Connecting camera, fixed in the center of the ceiling, which surveyed them and the room constantly. The colony-rules allowed citizens to turn off the cameras for sexual meetings, though this was neither recommended, nor encouraged.
They ended the meal by drinking a hot, invigorating potion, and by sniffing from a special tube containing a unique sharp aroma, which provided after-meal relaxation and enjoyment.
“How is she?” S.O. finally asked.
“Asleep,” replied D.L. “Knows nothing.”
“What would you do now?”
He hesitated momentarily. The listening devices were always on, in addition and apart from the cameras, and were connected to the colony’s Control-Room. The general purpose was not ostensibly to put the colony-citizens under constant surveillance – though it did exactly that, since all conversations were digitally recorded – but rather to be prepared in case there was a need, or even just a wish, to listen to the recordings. Such as an order from the Mother-Colony some time in the future.
“What would you like to hear?” S.O. intelligently switched to a different subject.
“Something quiet,” he replied, “from the days before the war.”
Again, she grabbed her small electronic distance-device and rapidly entered some choices. The tunes that soon filled the room were quiet and relaxing, yet also complex, reminiscent of compositions from long ago by those strange, eccentric people who wrote and played music on various old instruments. It was so different here in the colony, where the sophisticated music-computer kept producing endless variations based on the creations of the past. D.L. loved to listen to the old music, finding it inspiring and thought-provoking.
“I’m going to take her out,” he said calmly.
“I understand.”
He smiled at her, grateful. Relationships between the sexes in the colony were not based on personal-affection or mutual-attraction. Love had been nonexistent for many years. It was, according to the last broadcast from the Mother-Colony, “for everybody everywhere!” It ruled over the universe. Over the colonies, too, wherever they were: high above, floating in the skies, or deep down, fixed in the ground. Among the people themselves, though, love – as was privacy – was strongly discouraged. It was actually not allowed by the colony-rules. There was no hatred, either, and there were no wars. Quarrels and fights between the colonies, or the colony-citizens themselves, were long extinct.