Today We Choose Faces

De: Roger Zelazny

Narrado por: Eric Michael Summerer

Organized crime magnate Angelo Di Negri is a man out of time and place. He'd been gunned down more than a century ago. But through the wonders of cryogenic storage his body had been preserved until such a time as his "family" had need of him and he could be safely revived. That time had arrived. But Angela discovered that not everything was as it seemed and that the fate of mankind would be determined by his success or by his failure.

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Could Have Been One of Zelazny's Best

This is not one of the novels that Zelazny is best known for, but with a little more work, it could have been. I was first introduced to it in high school when a good friend excitedly began talking about a book that is really concerned with a massive social engineering project...but I get ahead of myself.

Today We Choose Faces takes place a couple of hundred years into the future when Angelo, a hitman for the mob, is thawed out of cryogenic sleep because his descendants need him to kill someone. That opening section is classic Zelazny and just fun to read. What comes after, however, is the heart of the book, because Angelo finds himself in a situation in which he thinks he has a chance to save humanity from itself and keep it from killing off the human species.

Moving forward, we discover the world which we quickly figure out that Angelo created. In it, people are far less violent and more accepting than they were before. The price they pay for this is living in "the house" a supercity that is entirely enclosed. Violent crimes have become incredibly rare, so it is quite a surprise when our new hero dies in the opening sentences of this part of the book. He dies--but lives on thanks the science of cloning and telepathy which puts all of his experiences into a younger body.

What follows is his attempt to figure out who is trying to murder him and why they want him dead. This probably wouldn't have been very hard for him except that he too is a product of social engineering. The clones have been excising certain memories and personality traits from themselves so that they will not be sharks among minnows in the world they are creating.

It's a fascinating book, and if Zelazny had been just a little more interested in the social engineering aspects it would have been one of his greats. As it is, it is just a highly enjoyable adventure story.