The Inhuman Race
The year is 2033. The British Empire never fell. Communism never happened. The Commonwealth flies the flag of the Empire. Many of the Empire’s colonies are stripped bare in the name of British interests, powerless to resist. Upon this stage is Ceylon — a once-proud civilization tracing itself back to the time of the Pharaohs, reduced but not dead. The Great Houses of Kandy still control the most lucrative trade routes, since even dust and ashes can serve a purpose.
In the midst of the ruins, a robotic voice with a Chinese accent declares that the Bluetooth device is ready to pair. Something like a child stirs, a spear in its hand, waiting for a new day of killing to begin.
- Published: December 2018
- Publisher: HarperCollins India
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The Inhuman Race is available technically only in the Indian subcontinent (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka) through HarperCollins India, though international editions are available via Amazon.
“… ambitious speculative fiction, a narrative that crosses genres and geographies, with a setting that is part cyberpunk, part steampunk, part postcolonial.” — Huffpost
“A thought-provoking read — not least for the sequence where he subverts the philosopher John Searle’s famous Chinese Room argument to argue against its original premise — The Inhuman Race cements Yudhanjaya Wijeratne’s status as one of the subcontinent’s science fiction stars, especially when it comes to hard sci-fi. An intelligent tale that deftly weaves together the tropes of alternate history with themes of artificial intelligence and its implications when — and if — it achieves sentience.” — Gautam Shenoy, FactorDaily
Behind the Scenes
The Inhuman Race was my second novel, directly after Numbercaste. Numbercaste had wound up being mildly prophetic, and it made sense to continue the five-minutes-into-the-future thing. Policy circles (the kind I was working in) love this futurism stuff.
So I decided to do something totally different. The Inhuman Race, born from my love of Bioshock, was set in an alternate future. I have some early notes speculating on technological directions.
Seeds
- The Chinese Room thought experiment explored by philosopher John Searle
- Bioshock and Marathon: Durandal
- Lord of the Flies by William Golding and Battle Royale by Takami Koushun
- The records of the British empire, what it did to Sri Lanka, and also the strange co-dependent complicity that the colonized often fall into
- Local geopolitics around Sri Lanka, especially the tensions around the then-controversial Colombo Port City (which I reported on) and of the China-vs-West tussles playing out in both culture and politics