Synchronicity and speculation in fiction

William Gibson is one of the founders of "cyberpunk" science fiction. His new $10 paperback (and a bargain at that price), Spook Country, is probably one of his most optimistic novels in the genre. He prides himself on writing about the "near future," one in which the technology he describes already exists in proto-type (like the bicycle made out of paper in Virtual Light).

In Spook Country, the background technology is virtual reality, "locative art," but the dangerous uses to which such art is put -- by the media, the government, terrorists and organized crime -- requires non-violent intervention from self-appointed guardians of our civil rights.

On a minor note of synchronicity, I had just heard a piece on NPR about the popularity of a new cuisine Vietnamese Pho noodles, when I proceeded to read a chapter in which characters comment on the quality of the "pho" they are eating. As usual, Gibson's book (first published in 2007) is well ahead of the curve. Bouncing from lower Manhattan (with a fantastically realistic chase amid the Union Square farmer's market) to Sunset Boulevard and the Vancouver waterfront, Gibson opens a window on a new kind of outlaw gypsy family, one with Chinese-Russian-Cuban roots and the protection of vodoo gods, martial arts, and iPods.