Going, Going, Gone

Infobox Book |
name = Going, Going, Gone
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption =
author = Jack Womack
illustrator =
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
series = Dryco series
genre = Speculative fiction, dystopian novel, alternate history novel
publisher = Grove Press
pub_date = 2000
media_type = Print (hardcover and paperback)
pages = 192 pp (hardcover)
isbn = ISBN 080211685X
preceded_by = Elvissey
followed_by =

"Going, Going, Gone" is a 2000 alternate history novel by Jack Womack. [http://www.well.com/conf/inkwell.vue/topics/118/Jack-Womack-Going-Going-Gone-page01.html Jack Womack: Going, Going, Gone] , interview with Cory Doctorow, "The WELL", 2001-08-01] As the sixth and final installment of his acclaimed Dryco series, the novel was the subject of much anticipation and speculation prior to its release,cite book | last = Sawyer | first = Andy | title = Speaking Science Fiction | publisher = Liverpool University Press | location = Liverpool | year = 2000 | isbn = 0853238340 |pages=p.198 ] cite web |url=http://www.scifi.com/sfw/books/sfw6761.html |title= Going, Going, Gone |work=SCI FI Weekly |date=March 19, 2001 |accessdate=2008-10-02 |authorlink=Paul Di Filippo |first=Paul |last=Di Filippo] and critically well-received.

Plot summary

Set in 1968 New York in an alternate universe to the Dryco universe of the previous five iterations of the series,cite book | last = Dukes | first = Paul | title = The Superpowers | publisher = Routledge | location = New York | year = 2000 | isbn = 041523042X |pages=p.102–3 ] "Going, Going, Gone" nevertheless disposes of several of the series' characters in its closing chapters. Its protagonist is Walter Bullitt, an egocentric expert in psychoactive substances who freelances for various branches of the United States government spy apparatus. Though he passes for white, Bullitt is in fact of African-American descent in a world where almost all full-blooded members of that race died sometime in the early twentieth century in an apparently engineered plague and all black music is banned. Walter becomes subject to increasingly strange experiences, hearing voices and seeing ghosts from a parallel New York which is blending into his one. Walter is taken to this alternative New York which has been flooded and moved north, populated by black people and an analogue of television absent from his world. The novel ends with the two epistemic worlds converging into a New York which is, in the words of critic Paul Dukes a "morally better place than either of the two which composed it".

Critical reception

"Going, Going, Gone" was well-received critically. "Publishers Weekly" called it an "intriguing, clever novel", with the potential for crossover appeal as well as for satisfying fans of the series.cite journal| title=Going, Going, Gone.(Review) |journal=Publishers Weekly |date=February 19, 2001 |quote=Futurist wunderkind Womack (Random Acts of Senseless Violence) concludes his heralded Ambient series with this intriguing, clever novel set in an alternate, semihistorical 1968. … Although his hero's vernacular may annoy some readers, Womack has crafted a fast-moving, hipper-than-hip science fiction novel meshing the exuberant wordplay of Anthony Burgess with the high-concept what-if history Philip Dick made famous with The Man in the High Castle. (Mar.) Forecast: This final, top-notch Ambient installment has the potential to generate considerable crossover appeal while satisfying old fans. Those in the know will correct anyone who tries to call this cyberpunk lit no "cyber" is involved but readers of William Gibson should gravitate toward Womack.] Biopunk author and reviewer Paul Di Filippo hailed the work as a groundbreaking achievement:

"Publishers Weekly" compared the novel's prose with that of Anthony Burgess, but conjectured that the vernacular "may annoy some readers". "The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction" also singled out Womack's prose for attention, commenting:

Related topics

*"The Man in the High Castle", a similar alternate history novel by Philip K. Dick
*Slipstream, a genre which crosses speculative and literary fiction

References