2312 (novel)
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| Author | Kim Stanley Robinson |
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| Cover artist | Kirk Benshoff |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| Publisher | Orbit |
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Publication date
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May 23, 2012 |
| Media type | Print (hardcover and electronic book) and audio-CD |
| Pages | 576 |
| Awards | Nebula Award for Best Novel |
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2312 is a 2012 science fiction novel written by Kim Stanley Robinson. It is set in the year 2312 when society has spread out across the solar system. The novel won the 2013 Nebula Award for Best Novel.
The novel is set, as the title suggests, in the year 2312, in the great city of Terminator on Mercury, which is built on gigantic tracks in order to constantly stay on the planet's nightside. Swan Er Hong, an artist and former asteroid terrarium designer, is grieving over the sudden death of her step-grandmother, Alex, who was very influential among the inhabitants of Terminator. After the funeral procession, a conference is held among the family and the close friends of Alex (some of whom Swan has never heard of, including Fitz Wahram, a native of the moon Titan, whom Swan dislikes). Following the conference, Swan decides to head out to Io to visit another friend of Alex's, called Wang, who has designed one of the largest qubes or quantum computers. While Swan is visiting Wang on Io, an apparent attack of some sort fails. An attack on Terminator shortly follows; a meteorite of artificial origin destroys the city's tracks, stopping the city and exposing it to sun, essentially cooking it. As Swan travels, she learns more of the mystery surrounding her grandmother's death and the destruction of her home-city of Terminator. With Wahram and Genette, Swan travels throughout the solar system and investigates an escalating series of conspiracies.
Inspector Genette eventually discovers how the artificial meteorite that destroyed Terminator was created: someone launched a large number of smaller objects on trajectories that would eventually cause them to coalesce above Mercury, but low enough that the planet's defense system could not destroy the now large object in time. The complexity of the attack leads her to determine that quantum computers must have been used.
Meanwhile, Swan and Wahram become involved in restoring and re-wilding the climate-change-ravaged Earth by returning thousands of species from space-based temporary environments to their home environments on the Earth.
In the world of the novel, the planets Mercury, Venus, and Mars are inhabited by humans, as are the moons of Saturn and Jupiter. Humans have a presence or are building a presence on all the inhabitable surfaces within the solar system (including moons and satellites). Almost all of the Solar System's asteroids have been hollowed out to form "terrariums," which include interior artificial environment designed to mimic various biomes found on earth or combinations of different biomes. Some of these serve as animal reserves or farms for endangered or underproduced flora and fauna. Humans take shuttles to these asteroids and use them as transportation around the system. Some of these terraria fail, such as one where a mistake in programming led to the near-destruction of the asteroid, and another where a small crack in the terrarium's ice wall destroyed most of its population.
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