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Reading “The Data Raiders” by Joan Fletcher
Restorative Justice meets Mandelbrot in a crisis
Joan Fletcher’s novel, The Data Raiders (recently updated and available as an Ebook), is more than a good story. Fletcher uses her characters to explore the ways that societal change can happen and how we might restore respect and responsibility to relationships, communities, and nations.
In reading the novel, I got a sense of the urgency for change felt by the author. I feel it too. We are running out of time.
The story centers on Dr. Sophie Tessier, a scientist who is working on a solution to the problem of microplastics in our biosphere.
Set in urban Vancouver, British Columbia, the novel has Sophie and her friends and co-workers fighting to stop a tar sands oil pipeline from being built. The potential consequences of an oil spill in the delicate ecosystems of British Columbia are enough to cause Sophie’s circle to start a separatist political party.
As a scientist who wants to be able to collaborate with other scientists, Sophie wants to stay on the sidelines of politics, but she gets drawn into the center of the movement through a series of actions by others. Her life is threatened, and she needs to rely on people and transformative ideas in order to navigate the danger.
