I've always liked the science fiction of John Varley but I'll quickly admit that his work of the first ten years or so of his career impressed me more than the last ten years or so.
His latest Red Lightning, is a sorta sequal to Red Thunder but there's nothing that happened in Thunder that is required in Lightning. Where Thunder was a somewhat charming Heinlein juvenilve-esque "let's build a spaceship in the old barn," Lightning is an absolutely devestating satire on our current fascisto-military-industrial-security state and the lengths they will go to in order to control energy resources. Also throw in the ineptitude of how the world's richest state deals with enormous natural disasters.
It's Voltaire satire, not Swift so you won't cut yourself but it's worth the read.
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