A Hologram for the King

—I’m watching this thing about how a gigantic new bridge in Oakland, California, is being made in China. Can you imagine? Now they’re making our goddamned bridges, Alan. I got to say, I saw everything else coming. When they closed down Stride Rite, I saw it coming. When you start shopping out the bikes over there in Taiwan, I saw it coming. I saw t

—Why would they advertise those kinds of freedoms if they weren’t sincere? Alan asked. The risk Abdullah’s taking in pissing off the conservatives is pretty big. Yousef shrugged. —Who knows? It impresses guys like you, so maybe it’s working.

His only weapons against her were silence, truculence; he cultivated an occasional brooding intensity. He had never been as stubborn as he was with her. This was the version of himself who spent six years with her. This version of Alan was fiery, jealous, always on his heels. He had never felt more vital.

The age of machines holding dominion over man had come. This was the downfall of a nation and the triumph of systems designed to thwart all human contact, human reason, personal discretion and decision making. Most people did not want to make decisions. And too many of the people who could make decisions had decided to cede them to machines.

Americans are born knowing everything and nothing. Born moving forward, quickly, or thinking they are.

The Earth is an animal that shakes off its fleas when they dig too deep, bite too hard. It shifts and our cities fall; it sighs and the coasts are overtaken. We really shouldn’t be here at all.

So PPG had invented a new type of blast-resistant glass, only to have a Chinese company use that technology to build the glass, cheaper, and sell it back to the Port Authority, which was attempting, at least, to resurrect something like pride and resilience in the center of the white-hot center of everything American.

The desert wind was strong, and the dust came over the street like fog. Still, two men were sweeping the road. Yousef pointed and laughed. —This is where the money’s going. They’re sweeping the sand in a desert.