Review: Waste Tide, Chen Qiufan

Review: Waste Tide, Chen Qiufan

Book cover of Waste Tide by Chen Qiufan (English translation by Ken Liu: a man an woman look up to a giant battle mech.

A good read set against an all too realistic yet futuristic setting. The western world is dumping its waste elsewhere and China greedily takes the few bucks to process said waste at great cost to people and nature. Plenty of blame to go around, such as the business man working for a crooked company from the USA, Chinese government officials and even the locals share in it.

However, the story is more than a lament against the sick mechanics of the global economy. It is a story about two people from very different backgrounds finding each other, then losing each other again. But it’s also a grimy cyberpunk story about cyborgs, augmented reality and mind-enhancing viruses.

It was quite a long read. Perhaps a bit too long, for at times, I felt the story was dragging, and the narrative was hampered by the occasional info dump. I also felt some of the elements of the story, especially Scott’s arc, were a bit disjointed. Nothing too intrusive though, and it doesn’t take away from the fact that this is a good and entertaining book.

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