Noon: 22nd Century by Arkady & Boris Strugatsky

One of the five most fantastic books I've ever read. The Universe, Planet Earth (Present and Future), Technology, Philosophy--all of these are perfectly, carefully and, I think, Realistically thought out and presented in a series of interludes of a day or two here and there involving the same characters over a century or so's worth of time. My mood, my outlook on life, and my excitement about reading new books...all three of these things were already in Top Form for me, but this book bumped them all up to a new level.

Arkady and Boris wrote it in bits and pieces beginning in 1960 and finishing in 1968. It was translated into English in 1978. In real life, Boris was an astrophysicist and computer engineer, while Arkaday was a translator of Japanese literature.

I won't give anything away--but a few of the brilliant ideas that come through in this book:

1) Biologically (as opposed to Technologically) Advanced Alien Civilizations

2) Nanotechnology--it may not have started to exist until the '80s, but the Strugatskys imagine/theorize about it here under the term Embryomechanics

3) The spiritual satisfaction and rewards that can come from a life spent Whaleherding (!)

4) If Communism had worked, and hadn't been weighted down by greedy or incompetent folks at the top...well we would end up with the kind of Earth that this book's characters live in. Added benefit of this: we would all call each other Comrade.

One comment about finding this book: it's long out of print and new copies go for over $100, so you will want to look at the Used booksellers on amazon and elsewhere for a reasonably priced (i.e. $15) copy.