We Are Not Anonymous by Stephen Oram (book review).

‘We Are Not Anonymous’ by Stephen Oram is a science fiction novel about the possible near future set in Great Britain. It extrapolates the themes and struggles of today into tomorrow, acting as a political commentary on our current decisions and actions.

Beth’s ambition is to become a respected caster. She attends the protests at OmegaSimera (OS) headquarters, where she faces accusations of child exploitation, in an attempt to make her mark. The OS Bot Police (BP) with their drone swarms try to break up the protests. In response, the crowd hold up their globules, a more modern and useful form of smartphones, to identify themselves, chanting, ‘We Are Not Anonymous’. They are refusing to be averaged by big data blending.

Before Beth can hold up her own globule to claim caster immunity, a muscled woman grabs her and successfully drags her away from the protests. Naomi tells her if she wants to find out the truth about child exploitation, she should head for the seawall they are building in Selby. It is made from piled obsolete objects solidified with poured-on binding agent. However, before the binding agent is added, children burrow into its small tunnels and crevices to scavenge valuable materials. It’s dangerous. She helps a man, Tam, to rescue one child who is lost inside the seawall before the binding agent sets to trap him inside permanently. It is more than enough proof that children are being exploited.

This triggers a lifelong protest and fight against OS and its director, Kai. Naomi is one of the protest movement’s leaders, and Beth is a caster trying to dig up the truth.

Beth marries Tam, and they have a child, Alex. He gets caught up in the child exploitation. Beth and Naomi set out to rescue him from Freeship One, a vast ship captained by Kai that offers people wherever it docks new technology they have developed. Kai, through OS, exploits child labour in various ways, including experimenting on them to develop the new gizmos and foodstuffs.

While overtly continuing its protests, the movement works quietly to undermine the increasingly tighter stranglehold that Kai’s developed AIs hold over people. If they don’t conform, they are ‘zeroed’ and are left to struggle on the edges of society, scraping together the wherewithal to stay alive.

‘We Are Not Anonymous’ bubbles with ideas of what changes we might see in society. Crucially, it runs with themes of what can happen when oligarchs do not use their power for the benefit of society, the effects and consequences of adapting to climate change, and the increasing pervasiveness of AI and their control over human lives. Not all the consequences tend towards dystopia; too many do. There is some beneficial stuff. A main message is that it’s how people use objects that makes them good or bad, not the objects themselves.

With improvement on improvement, whether it be tech or the way of life, I would have expected a better sense of time passing. However, the time lapse from the previous scene caught me off guard on several occasions. My anchor line for time became Alex’s age. I would have also appreciated a map of England where a lot of the action takes place; I was never much good at geography! Yes, I resorted to maps to find out where places like Withernsea and Manningtree were. It gave me a better sense of direction of travel of the protagonists.

Towards the end of ‘We Are Not Anonymous’, I found the superfast pace of change bewildering and, to a certain extent, unbelievable. On reflection, this is not surprising given that cyberwarfare development is on an accelerating curve. As Arthur C Clarke mentioned, ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’ It is to Stephen Oram’s credit that he could author such an imaginative time.

Overall, ‘We Are Not Anonymous’ should be a must-read for anyone interested in how the future might turn out. It has warnings about the dangers but some solutions, too.

Rosie Oliver

March 2025

(pub: Nudge The Future Fiction, 2025. 354 page paperback. Price: £11.99 (UK). ISBN: 978-1-0685764-0-9).

check out website: https://nudgethefuture.net