Cover image of "Termination Shock," a thriller about combating climate change

For decades, as climate change has wreaked havoc ever more visibly, scientists and engineers have advanced a plethora of technological fixes. Not just switching to renewables such as solar and wind power but direct interventions into the climate through geoengineering. Examples range from the modest and gradual to the fanciful. Carbon capture, for example. Making clouds brighter. Shooting salt aerosols into the air. Launching mirrors or a massive sun shade into space to block the sun. And injecting sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere. There it would form reflective sulfate aerosols, effectively blocking some sunlight from reaching Earth and cooling the planet. Celebrated science fiction author Neal Stephenson explores this approach in his recent novel, Termination Shock. The book is a thriller about combating climate change. It’s crammed with colorful characters in a suspenseful and action-filled story that spans the planet.

Four captivating central characters

Termination Shock is a big book, and the story could easily spin out of control, it’s so hard to contain on the printed page. But Stephenson holds it all together with four central characters who anchor the tale.

The Queen of the Netherlands

Queen Frederika of the Netherlands, who calls herself by the commoner name, Saskia. Like her father before her, she flies jet aircraft for pleasure. And the story opens as Saskia crashes an old rented jet into the runway at the airport in Waco, Texas. The aircraft’s wheels have plowed into a herd of feral hogs with an alligator in pursuit. (I did say colorful, right?)

A Comanche US Army veteran

A mixed-race Texan, who is officially Comanche, is also pursuing the hogs. It’s his business. The creatures have been a menace throughout West Texas, and he travels on contract to kill as many of them as he can. His name is Rufus, known to many as Red. He’s a 20-year veteran of the US Army. And he’s a lot smarter than he looks.

A Texas billionaire

T. R. Schmidt, PhD, is a billionaire who owns a large chain of truck stops, among many other businesses. He’s known to the public as TR McHooligan, the character he played in a series of commercials for his truck stops. But he is also a credentialed climate scientist and is sponsoring a conference in Houston, where he will host several of the Earth’s most threatened places. Venice. The City of London. And the Netherlands. Which is why Saskia has come to Texas.

A Canadian Sikh martial arts champion

A young Canadian Sikh man who calls himself Laks is visiting his ancestral homeland in the Punjab. There he learns the traditional Sikh martial art of gatka. It’s a form of stick-fighting, ideally suited to the ongoing Indian border war with China. A ceasefire is in effect there, prohibiting the use of guns. This limits the fighting to what is literally the use of sticks and stones. Laks finds the opportunity to prove himself in battle irresistible.

Stephenson’s story unfolds along four tracks, each reflecting the life of one of these central characters.

Termination Shock by Neal Stephenson (2021) 716 pages ★★★★★

Before and after photos of Houston under water, a familiar science in this thriller about combating climate change
Aerial view of Houston before and after flooding caused by a monster hurricane, a familiar scene in this prescient novel about climate change. Image: CNBC

Geoengineering to the rescue?

The central conceit of this near-future novel is that TR Schmidt has built the world’s largest gun on his million-acre ranch on the Mexican border in West Texas. There, he makes use of the abundant sulfur resources he mines through one of his companies. Mixing the sulfur with oxygen, he then shoots the resulting oxide in huge artillery shells far into the stratosphere. Schmidt is singlehandedly launching a serious effort in geoengineering to cool the planet and thus eventually arrest climate change. And he has summoned Saskia and her counterparts from Venice and the City of London to witness the inauguration of his project. He hopes, of course, that the example he sets will induce others to mimic him.

You’ll note that other countries in even greater danger from climate change—the Maldives and Bangladesh, for example—are missing. TR has invited only those with the resources and the clout to join him in solving the climate challenge.

In the pages that follow, Stephenson relates the progress of TR’s effort and the unfolding response in the Netherlands as well as in India and China. The scene shifts from Texas, to the Hague, to Papua New Guinea, to the Punjab and the Actual Line of Control between India and China. The suspense builds, because many in the north favor what the Texan is doing. But in Asia the response is far from positive. There will be conflict, and Stephenson’s tale will steadily build toward a spectacular climax.

About the author

Photo of Neal Stephenson, author of this thriller about combating climate change
Neal Stephenson. Image: XPrize Foundation

Neal Stephenson is best known for his prescient cyberpunk novels Snow Crash (1992) and The Diamond Age (1995). He has written a total of 19 novels since 1984 and won numerous awards for his work, including the Hugo. Stephenson was born in Fort Meade, Maryland, to a family of scientists and engineers. He holds a BA in Geography from Boston University. He has lived in Seattle with his family since 2012.

I recommend both Snow Crash and The Diamond Age by the author. I read them many years ago and enjoyed them immensely. I just haven’t read them recently enough to review them here.

You’ll find this novel in good company at Good books about climate change.

For more good reading, check out:

And you can always find my most popular reviews, and the most recent ones, on the Home Page. I’ve posted more than 2,300 book reviews on the site. There, you can take your pick of four weekly newsletters I send to subscribers. But don’t worry. It’s all ad-free. I don’t share email addresses. And there are no charges.