AustLit

'For We Are Young and Free is a collection of meta-fictional cyberpunk and supporting documents set in a pseudo-libertarian dystopian Australia. It extends the familiar tropes of cyberpunk to unfamiliar settings, including towns and small Australian cities, using the 'high-tech, low-life' aesthetic of the genre as a tool for comment on the economic and political realities of life in contemporary Australia. Neither strictly sci-fi nor experimental literature, unambiguously satirical or entirely dystopian, For We Are Young and Free creates a hybrid space between the genres, designed to make us speculate on the similarities between the world we live in and the worlds of science fiction, and what that might imply about the future of Australia.

'Tackling everything from metadata retention to philosophy of language, and income inequality to computer games, For We Are Young and Free is a bristling attack on the ideology of neoliberal capitalism, inspired by the Federal Australian government's continual attempts to re-define reality in the service of our privileged upper classes. Inspired by a combination of contemporary sci-fi, late-stage capitalism, and modernist dystopias like Brave New World and 1984, it simulates its fictional society at every level, showing the subcultures, social issues, and popular culture of a very dark portrayal of Australia in 2069. It also shows us how we got there, and hopefully what we can do to stop it happening.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.