"The New Imperialism" by David Harvey.
OK, so it's not a novel, but it's not directly relevant to anything I'm studying It's also very readable indeed, surprisingly so for an academic work, which is another reason why I'm counting it in my 50 books for this year
This starts off, as you might expect from the title, reading like Michael Moore would sound if he were rewritten by Salman Rushdie. It's not that bad though, it has no preachy message of vague dissatisfaction, nor does it judge the Neo-Cons in normative terms, rather it looks at explaining and documenting various trends in world politics, particularly with regard to US foreign policy, and where they may lead. It's well reviewed here, so I won't bother to bore you all, but here is one quote I particularly like:
"The real battleground where this [the new imperialism] must be fought out, of course, is within the United States. On this count there is some ground for faint hope since the severe curtailment of civil liberties and the long standing recognition that imperialism abroad will be bought at the cost of tyranny at home provides a serious basis for political resistance, at least on the part of those who truely believe in the Bill of Rights and whose vision of constitutionality is of a different sort to that of the neo-conservative majority that now dominate the Supreme Court. Such people are at least as numerous as the Christian Fundamentalists who now wield such a sinister influence in government. And there are signs within the Christian Majority, particularly among the leadership (which has broadly articulated and anti-war position), that there is a moral imperative to isolate Christian Fundamentalism and to assert a different kind of Christianity that espouses religous tolerance and peaceful co-existence with others."
This starts off, as you might expect from the title, reading like Michael Moore would sound if he were rewritten by Salman Rushdie. It's not that bad though, it has no preachy message of vague dissatisfaction, nor does it judge the Neo-Cons in normative terms, rather it looks at explaining and documenting various trends in world politics, particularly with regard to US foreign policy, and where they may lead. It's well reviewed here, so I won't bother to bore you all, but here is one quote I particularly like:
"The real battleground where this [the new imperialism] must be fought out, of course, is within the United States. On this count there is some ground for faint hope since the severe curtailment of civil liberties and the long standing recognition that imperialism abroad will be bought at the cost of tyranny at home provides a serious basis for political resistance, at least on the part of those who truely believe in the Bill of Rights and whose vision of constitutionality is of a different sort to that of the neo-conservative majority that now dominate the Supreme Court. Such people are at least as numerous as the Christian Fundamentalists who now wield such a sinister influence in government. And there are signs within the Christian Majority, particularly among the leadership (which has broadly articulated and anti-war position), that there is a moral imperative to isolate Christian Fundamentalism and to assert a different kind of Christianity that espouses religous tolerance and peaceful co-existence with others."