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Blood Music by Greg Bear (FUTURE CLASSICS SERIES)
01/10/2007 . Source: Geoff Willmetts 
pub: Gollancz. 243 page enlarged paperback. Price: £ 7.99 (UK only). ISBN: 978-0-575-081109-3. Buy Blood Music in the USA - or Buy Blood Music in the UK  check out website: www.orionbooks.co.uk
I remember reading this 1985 book 'Blood Music' a while back, even if I couldn't find my own copy with some affection. In the space of a short novel, author Greg Bear starts off with a seemingly innocent threat which suddenly escalates out of all proportion and with no way to stop it.
When Vergil Ulam does some unauthorised nano-technology research at his company's laboratories, he is fired. Using the excuse of clearing up, he decides the only way to take his sample with him is intravenously and injects himself, believing it wasn't removed within a few days, it would die anyway. Famous last words. The nano-technology in a new environment grows instead, repairing and enhancing Ulam, making him more confident and gaining a girl-friend that he also unwittingly infects. Its only when he gets the co-operation of a doctor friend and some proper analysis that he realises what he becomes. Ulam is a lot happier than his doctor pal and is rather enjoying it enough to share.
Without giving away too much of the plot, the story that switches to the boss of the genetic laboratory who when he realises he's infected, flies himself to Austria to be analysed as the American continent is cut-off as nearly everyone becomes infected. A few are left uninfected when, although not made exactly clear, the nanolytes can't do much for them. The 'blood music' of the title is how communication is made between the nanolytes and their hosts.
If you ever thought that Science Fiction had run out of ideas when it came to seeing scientific development run out of control then this book will make you think again. Although I doubt if self-replicating nano-technology is going to be on the cards any time soon, it is the one aspect that needs to be treated with respect so it doesn't become the be and end all in the development stage. About the only thing that now dates this book is the use of the World Trade Centre twin towers in New York for a location but I'm sure none of us would have guessed at its destruction back when this book was originally released. The subject here is still relevant and certainly worth reading. Greg Bear goes off on a more philosophical tangent towards the end, though, but I suspect this is more to do with the transformation that America goes through in becoming something entirely different. A cautionary tale with a difference.
GF Willmetts
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