Science Fiction | Review

Strugatsky’s Roadside Picnic and the Myth of Progress.

Technology can change the world — but not human nature.

• **Warning: Minor Spoilers!***

Created by author using Canva AI

Roadside Picnic delivers a complex look into the labyrinthine maze of being human. Its commentary on egocentricity, greed, corrupt bureaucracy, abuse of power, the limitations of our intelligence, and our tendency to manipulate each other are all front and center for the reader to readily observe. Despite the grit and grime that the Strugatskys bring, it not only demonstrates the unsavory side of ourselves, but also the softer attributes of humanity as well — love, friendship, determination, hope — all mixed with the muck to create a story that sticks underneath your fingernails long after you put the book down.

But it’s the subtle commentary on the human relationship with technology and how it conjoins with our longstanding psychological dependence on the messiah complex that makes this story so sticky. Even before modernity, mankind’s inventiveness propelled it to levels of success perhaps not seen before on Earth by any other species. Now, unlike anything seen before in our history, technology dominates our daily lives; more than ever, technological advancement has replaced the traditional ways of saving us from ourselves.

The hope for utopia has transformed from the supernatural nirvana, heaven, or reincarnation into the spaceship, the robot, artificial intelligence, and the limitless potential for discovery in the universe above us.

Roadside Picnic takes this hope and throws it out of a car window as it careens down the interstate at ninety miles an hour. But in a sleight of hand, it smuggles it back onto the seat next to you, where it rests until the reveal at the end. And while the reader waits for the final act, the story is busy reminding us that no matter how powerful the tools, no matter how wondrous the technology, we still have to bring our humanity — with all its defects and benefits — along for the ride.

And right from the start, it gets one of our greatest questions out of the way.

We are not alone. Aliens have finally arrived on Earth.

And they leave without uttering a word.

And as far as everyone can tell, they didn’t notice us at all. But they did leave behind something for us to discover.

ENTER THE ZONE

Created by author using Canva AI

In several locations around Earth, alien landing sites become the focus of humanity’s effort to understand what happened. The problem is that nothing the aliens left behind makes sense. The areas they occupied during the Visit have been altered and now resemble strange, alien-like environments where Earth’s normal rules and reality no longer apply. It’s not a sterile environment either; the visitors have left behind hundreds of objects and devices, carelessly strewn about across the landing sites. These artifacts defy humanity’s understanding of known physics and evade all attempts to decipher their purposes.

These former landing sites became known as the Zones.

Some of these Zones are located near where people live, which is where Roadside Picnic takes place, in a nondescript small town, perhaps somewhere in North America. It could be in a northern state, such as Michigan, in the USA, or in rural Canada. The specific location isn’t important; what matters is that it’s a normal place, populated by normal people living out their quiet lives. The type of place that is going nowhere quickly.

Why would this be important? Because Roadside Picnic is a story without heroes. Its prose is populated with the kind of people that you bump into at the grocery, or sit down next to at the neighborhood bar, or wave to on a walk around the block. It’s not an important city with a prestigious university filled with intellectuals or cutting-edge scientists. There isn’t a famous adventurer living there, or a famous war hero, or a captain of industry leading a technological revolution.

It’s a town lived in by folks who stay there all their lives, many of whom dream of leaving while they were younger, but stay because it’s home. It’s not ideal. It just is.

That is, it was that kind of place, until the Visitors came.

Roadside follows the story of Red, an ambitious local who is caught up in the fervor surrounding the Zones and becomes a Stalker. Stalkers are people, mostly young men, who enter the Zone to retrieve alien artifacts and sell them to the highest bidder. This occupation quickly becomes illegal as the government establishes control over the Zones. Some Stalkers, like Red, occasionally work for the government in an official capacity, and sometimes they work for private interests or corrupt government officials. It’s a free-for-all in the beginning, but the policing of the Zones becomes increasingly stricter. Stalkers are frequently imprisoned.

But not as often as the Zone kills them.

The dangers within the Zone are numerous and strange. Grinders, Hell slime, gravity wells, happy ghosts, invisible ovens.

Many of the alien devices break the laws of physics or seem supernatural. Many are fatal if not handled appropriately or avoided altogether. These traps are not unpredictable, however, and an experienced Stalker can successfully navigate the Zone to pillage the artifacts within. Red becomes one of the more famous local Stalkers.

As the years pass, Red becomes embroiled in the growing web of intrigue and power that settles into the once quiet town. Corrupt bureaucracy, shady leagues of alien artifact collectors, local vendettas, and a cabal of colorfully named Stalkers — Four Eyes, Gutalin, the Gopher, the Vulture — all complicate Red’s life. Especially Vulture.

Red has a complicated relationship with Vulture, who is an especially greedy and devious Stalker. Though Vulture and Red occasionally team up to raid the Zone, and Red saves Vulture’s life on one occasion, Red also detests Vulture for his ruthlessness and lies. As the story progresses, Vulture and his family become wealthy and influential, while Red struggles to make ends meet for his own family.

On top of all this, the Zone has more surprises than the strange alien devices. The dead rise out of their graves and wander from the cemetery into their former homes, including Red’s own father, and resume their former lives in a zombie trance. Anyone who inhabited an area around a Zone during the Visit can’t leave without bringing unexplainable and fatal misfortune to everyone around them. Stalkers have it particularly bad. After entering the Zone, they develop a genetic mutation that no one can explain. The results are devastating for their children, who are born alien.

While all of this is going on, scientists are struggling to understand anything coming out of the Zone. The world’s greatest minds can only manage to find uses for a small handful of alien artifacts, and no one can explain how they function scientifically. Nor can they explain any of the phenomena that come from the Zone. It’s beyond the capabilities of human intelligence.

So, what are the Strugatsky brothers trying to get at here? They kill the idea of an alien-induced enlightenment. Instead, you get a group of characters trying to manipulate each other to acquire monetary gain on the alien artifact black market, most of which may only be useless trinkets from outer space. They all have their own unique motives, and it is all great fun to read, but what is the point of all this?

There is a pivotal scene midway through, a conversation between Noonan and Valentine, a physicist studying the artifacts, that delivers a hint. Valentine is explaining to Noonan his idea about how the Visit may only amount to the alien’s version of a “roadside picnic”, a cosmic detour that left behind:

“remains of the campfire, apple cores, candy wrappers, tins, bottles, someone’s handkerchief, someone’s penknife, old ragged newspapers, coins, wilted flowers from another meadow…”

Noonan is shocked by the physicist’s hypothesis, still holding on to the belief in humanity’s importance and the assumption that intelligent aliens would have a similar psychological makeup to humans. Valentine continues to explain the depth of their ignorance regarding the alien devices and the effects of the Zone. Even the items they have found uses for are utterly beyond their comprehension, and their usefulness has only been a happy coincidence. In fact, the scientist understands so little of the impossible science behind the alien artifacts that it doesn’t even lead to new, important questions about the universe. They have no idea where to even begin.

Not to be dissuaded, Noonan continues pressing the issue, feeling that Valentine is holding back. Surely, man could be on the cusp of a truly revolutionary moment here.

“How is it all going to end? Say, take you scientists. Are you hoping to acquire something fundamental from the Zone, something that could really revolutionize our science, technology, way of life?”

Valentine shuts down Noonan’s optimism,

“You’re talking to the wrong man, Richard. I don’t like empty fantasies.”

Noonan and Valentine go back and forth, downing beer and cognac as they continue the debate into the night. At one point, Valentine lists several of the more legendary items within the Zone that are seldom talked about. One of these is the “wish machine”, also known as the Golden Sphere by local Stalkers.

Though disregarded as myth by most, including Red, this sphere is referenced multiple times throughout the story. It is believed to grant any wish a person truly desires. Vulture, in particular, is obsessed with it and tries to convince Red to grab it for him. Red believes it to be just a Stalker legend, but in the end, he is wrong. The Golden Sphere does exist, and Red ends up with it nearly in his grasp.

Roadside Picnic has several themes that the Strugatsky brothers are hashing out, most of which are right there in the foreground. Human corruption, greed, ego, and the limitations of our intelligence are all there for the reader to readily absorb without reading too finely between the lines. But throughout the story, something is hanging in the background, and it comes roaring into focus at the story’s climax and gut-wrenching conclusion.

THE PROMISE OF THE GOLDEN SPHERE

Image created by author with Canva AI

Historically, people have put much weight behind the idea of ‘The Savior’. Cultures have looked up to and relied on powerful figureheads. The warlord. The prophet. The stateman. The judge. The king. The messiah.

In the modern era, humankind’s mystical mind’s eye has turned its gaze to another potential source of redemption. Not one here on Earth, nor in the metaphysical heavens above, but amongst the stars and planets deep within the void. The presence of an alien intelligence would show us that we are not alone, stranded on our blue-green island, but are, instead, a part of something greater. That life can exist elsewhere and maybe deliver us the enlightenment we need to break free of our earthly bonds.

It’s a hope that keeps us pointed skyward, peering into the farthest reaches of space that our technology allows. To catch even the slightest glimpse of evidence that life is out there, waiting for us. Roadside Picnic delivers this hope right on our doorstep:

And says, “So what?”

The Visit is a cold event. The alien intelligence is so beyond our own that we can’t even comprehend their garbage, so beyond us that they regarded us like so many ants underneath the feet of carefree picnickers, using our home like a campground found off the highway in some backwoods corner of the universe.

However, this still could be a monumental event in human history. A spiritual awakening of sorts. An event that could, should, change humanity forever. It wouldn’t be the first science fiction to bring mankind face to face with a superior cosmic intellect after all.

But in Roadside Picnic, it doesn’t have this effect at all. People continue on being…well, people. They are still as narrow-minded, greedy, traitorous, self-serving, and contemptible as they were before the celestial tourists came and left behind their trash in our backyards. They fight over the alien artifacts, establish a black market to profit from the sale of devices they don’t understand, and turn on each other for the chance to collect big payouts.

Stalkers become a glamorous ideal for young, ambitious, and adventurous men, despite the illegality and high mortality rate, much like the modern image of the gangster in American culture. The items they procure from the Zone are wondrous, and some even have practical uses, such as an unlimited-energy cell modified to power cars, but the world loses interest in discovering the artifacts’ meaning and the scientific knowledge they could unlock. The potential to benefit humanity worldwide is barely an afterthought to the wealth and influence they bring through a manufactured market for simply possessing and exploiting them. And using them to exploit each other.

It’s a cutting message. We could replace the alien artifacts of Roadside with the real technologies humanity has produced on its own, and come out with the same feeling of stinging disappointment.

For all our advancements, all our inventions, how far along in our development are we really?

We have collectively witnessed many technological revolutions in our time as a self-aware species, providing ever-increasing levels of productivity, ease, connectivity, and abundance, and we may be standing on the threshold of another with the advances of Artificial Intelligence.

But what kind of future will this bring us?

The hope, as always, is that it will bring about a new, better world of abundance and human freedom. That maybe this time, this new technology, this new future, will be different than the last. It will propel us beyond the disappointments of past failures and accelerate the human race into the next golden age.

But here’s the problem, which is the same problem as it has always been: we have to bring ourselves along for the ride. And it’s books like Roadside Picnic that propose that humanity hasn’t evolved much over the millennia. We are still primates throwing stones and hoarding precious gems; focused on our own propagation, relentlessly pursuing the next big stimuli that injects our brains with the neurochemicals that brighten the grim world around us.

But it isn’t hopeless, not in real life, and not in Roadside Picnic. There are veins of hope that run throughout the story.

The friendship between Noonan and Red endures the impossible circumstances dominating their lives. Despite hardships and the shifting loyalties of opportunists, they keep trust alive between them.

And Red is fundamentally a good man. Flawed, of course, but he cares for his family and takes the great risk of being a Stalker to provide a better life than they otherwise would have. Despite his daughter becoming more alien as time passes, Red does everything he can to help her live a good life in a world that will never accept her as a product of the Zone. Though his connection weakens as the fragments of her humanity fade away, he never gives up on her.

And in the end, the Golden Sphere isn’t a myth. It’s real. Perhaps it isn’t what they believe it to be, maybe it doesn’t make all your dreams come true, but it’s there waiting. Even as Red plots his revenge on the Vulture, ready to betray a boy who entrusts him completely, in hopes of reaching the sphere. To become the kind of man he has always detested to save himself, his family, and his daughter. He crawls his way towards that hope and finds he can only think of one thing to wish for. The dying words of a boy whose true wish he was too embarrassed to say out loud to Red, but who screamed it out in solemn sincerity as he rushed to his demise. Red could only think of that one wish.

“Happiness, free, for everyone, and let no one be forgotten!”

My copy

Event Horizon Books Rating: 10/10 — A must-read!

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