The ongoing coronavirus pandemic may have canceled conventions, book expos, writers festivals, and book tours around the world, which means many authors have switched to virtual events and release parties to promote their works. This week, K. M. Szpara will be discussing his book Docile, published by Tor.com Publishing earlier this month, in conversation with Hugo Award-winning author N. K. Jemisin.
The authors will be conducting their discussion over the live-stream website Crowdcast, and while the event is free, you have to register here to watch. It takes place on Thursday, April 2, at 8 p.m. ET.
Buy the Book
Docile
Here’s the book’s official synopsis:
K. M. Szpara’s Docile is a science fiction parable about love and sex, wealth and debt, abuse and power, a challenging tour de force that at turns seduces and startles.
There is no consent under capitalism.
To be a Docile is to be kept, body and soul, for the uses of the owner of your contract. To be a Docile is to forget, to disappear, to hide inside your body from the horrors of your service. To be a Docile is to sell yourself to pay your parents’ debts and buy your children’s future.
Elisha Wilder’s family has been ruined by debt, handed down to them from previous generations. His mother never recovered from the Dociline she took during her term as a Docile, so when Elisha decides to try and erase the family’s debt himself, he swears he will never take the drug that took his mother from him.
Too bad his contract has been purchased by Alexander Bishop III, whose ultra-rich family is the brains (and money) behind Dociline and the entire Office of Debt Resolution. When Elisha refuses Dociline, Alex refuses to believe that his family’s crowning achievement could have any negative side effects—and is determined to turn Elisha into the perfect Docile without it.
Content warning: Docile contains forthright depictions and discussions of rape and sexual abuse.
Docile is out now from Tor.com Publishing. You can read the first six chapters here.
