Dantec, Maurice G
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1959-2016) French author, in Canada from 1999; of his several gonzo sf novels, most of which have aroused interest and ire in France for their inflammatory (but not orthodox) right-wing polemics, Babylon Babies (1999; trans Noura Wedell 2005) begins in Technothriller mode with a moderately prescient vision of the Middle East and adjacent Asia as the diseased focus of early twenty-first-century wars, but moves into Transcendence country as the young woman, hired as a mule to transport a virus into Canada, turns out to be pregnant with twins who embody a Gaia which thinks it is time for a change. This novel was filmed as Babylon A.D. (2008), directed by Mathieu Kassovitz. The protagonist of Cosmos Incorporated (2005; trans Tina A Kover 2008), suffering from imposed Amnesia in a Computer-governed totalitarian state known as UniWorld, escapes planet Earth in the process of coming into his true nature (see as usual with this author Religion; Transcendence). Grande Jonction (2006; trans Tina A Kover as Grand Junction 2009) is set in a Ruined Earth version of America – Grand Junction is not, however, the Colorado city of that name – after a viral Disaster has crippled the world's electronics. [JC]
Maurice Georges Dantec
born Grenoble, France: 13 June 1959
died Montreal, Quebec: 25 June 2016
works
- La Sirène Rouge ["The Red Siren"] (Paris: Gallimard, 1992) [pb/]
- Les racines du mal ["The Roots of Evil"] (Paris: Gallimard, 1995) [pb/]
- Babylon Babies (Paris: Gallimard, 1999) [pb/]
- Babylon Babies (New York: Semiotext(e) Sci-Fi, 2005) [trans by Noura Wedell of the above: pb/David Ashley]
- Villa Vortex (Paris: Gallimard, 2003) [pb/]
- Cosmos Incorporated (Paris: Albin Michel, 2005) [pb/]
- Cosmos Incorporated (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 2008) [trans by Tina A Kover of the above: pb/David Stevenson]
- Grande Jonction (Paris: Albin Michel, 2006) [pb/]
- Grand Junction (New York: Ballantine Books/Del Rey, 2009) [trans by Tina A Kover of the above: pb/David Stevenson]
links
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