Harmony

by Keikaku (Project) Itoh

Overview

In the future, Utopia has finally been achieved thanks to medical nanotechnology and a powerful ethic of social welfare and mutual consideration. This perfect world isn't that perfect though, and three young girls stand up to totalitarian kindness and super-medicine by attempting suicide via starvation. It doesn't work, but one of the girls—Tuan Kirie—grows up to be a member of the World Health Organization. As a crisis threatens the harmony of the new world, Tuan rediscovers another member of her suicide pact, and together they must help save the planet...from itself.

In the future, Utopia has finally been achieved thanks to medical nanotechnology and a powerful ethic of social welfare and mutual consideration. This perfect world isn't that perfect though, and three young girls stand up to totalitarian kindness and super-medicine by attempting suicide via starvation. It doesn't work, but one of the girls—Tuan Kirie—grows up to be a member of the World Health Organization. As a crisis threatens the harmony of the new world, Tuan rediscovers another member of her suicide pact, and together they must help save the planet...from itself.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781421536439
Publisher:	Haikasoru
Publication date:	07/20/2010
Series:	Harmony
Edition description:	Original
Pages:	256
Sales rank:	531,697
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.90(d)
Lexile:	870L (what's this?)
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Keikaku (Project) Itoh was born in Tokyo in 1974. He graduated from Musashino Art University. In 2007, he debuted with Gyakusatsu Kikan (Genocidal Organs) and took first prize in the "Best SF of 2007" in SF Magazine. He is also the author of Metal Gear Solid: Guns of the Patriots, a Japanese-language novel based on the popular video game series. After a long battle with cancer, Itoh passed away in March 2009. Itoh wrote Harmony while in the hospital receiving treatment for the disease.

Editorial Reviews

Gr 9 Up—Itoh ups the dystopian-fiction ante considerably by including a backstory, main plot, and postcript, each of which is disturbing in its own way. In Japan, Tuan Kirie and her friends Miach Mihie and Cian Reikado are taught about a period called the Maelstrom during which nuclear bombs and diseases ran rampant and destroyed the country once known as the United States of America. A horror of disease has driven the older generation to remake society, replacing nation-states with smaller "admedistrations," organizational bodies that use nanotech "medicules" and societal pressure to ensure that each person is as healthy as possible. The three teenagers, led by Miach, attempt to use this technology to commit suicide and thus rob society of valuable resources—their own lives. Miach is successful but Cian reveals the plot and she and Tuan are saved. Thirteen years later, Tuan continues to rebel, even while she attains a high-level position in the international medical police corps. It is under this aegis that she investigates when Cian commits suicide (one of thousands, worldwide). During her search, Tuan discovers that there may be something even more repugnant than a world of perfectly healthy people. Itoh presents a future in which humanity willingly collaborates in its own subjugation to "medical correctness." Fans of Orwell and Westerfeld will find this novel intriguing.—Eric Norton, McMillan Memorial Library, Wisconsin Rapids, WI

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