Review of Egalitarius, a Novel by C. L. Wells

When everybody is equal, nobody is equal. Egalitarius, a science-fiction book by C.L. Wells is set in a dystopic and gloomy future, where people are forced to deny their identities to comply with the laws imposed by the American government.

The future narrated by Wells is very close. We are in the 2040s, in a turbulent and unrestful America shaken by protests and riots orchestrated by minorities.

These minorities include LGBT, or simply people who didn’t have the fortune to be attractive.

They feel underrepresented and marginalized, and this deep frustration pushes them to violently claim their rights.

But the American Administration can’t tolerate street riots that risk to become uncontrollable, and so decides to resolve the issue with a law that nobody would ever have imagined: as of the year 2047, Americans will be forced to hide their aspect under helmets, compelled to study the same subjects, think the same things, and follow the same beliefs.

It is an alienating world dominated by public laws and rules, what Wells describes, there is even the Beauty Index which assesses the degree of loveliness of people. It aims to prevent those who are beautiful from having advantages in their career. Even the real names are prohibited.

Americans are thus forced to submit themselves to a cruel and oppressive law, where nobody must reveal their gender, sexual orientation, face, and even emotions.

The main characters, a group of students, use fictional names, Tam, is Thomas, in reality, and Thomas is Sam, in reality. Those who try to rebel to this law, those who try to show their faces, real names, and ideas, are arrested, jailed and tortured.

And it is in this stage that the novel takes an upsetting turn which evokes the gruesome tortures of the Nazis.

The tale is, in fact, strongly focused on the topic of public control, in a sort of futuristic Communism acted by a Country which is the exact opposite of Communism.

Egalitarius is the title the author used to describe this not very futuristic, and quite realistic American government where the United States are strongly committed to making all people equal, in accordance with the fact that they define themselves as the most exemplary democracy of the world. The outcomes, however, are totally different.

The narrative pattern recalls the worst dictatorships that humans have ever experienced over history, and it is not a chance that readers will see the most concrete examples of our current reality, in this novel.

The hidden faces can be the same faces we obscure behind our social media profiles. The homologation of our habits and customs which pushes us to desire identical things, and cultivate similar dreams is the same one created by digital marketing.

The rebels who are subjected to electroshock and brainwashing to forget their legit instinct of freedom, seems to be our old parents when they develop the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease. They are unable to recognize their same sons, and their gaze is filled only with emptiness.

After the tortures, the protagonists return home deprived from their most intimate remembrances, and, most of all, from their true identity, and uniqueness.

After slow-paced chapters, the novel resumes a certain vigor in the central pages, and shows what the author already mentioned in the subtitle: no freedom is possible without respect for difference and diversity.

Uniqueness must not be suppressed, but fostered, because it is through singularity that humankind evolves.

Egalitarius is a tale which shows what happens when the oppressed becomes oppressor.

It is the warning of history that repeats itself, such as in the French Revolution, in which the values of Libertè (Freedom), Egalitè (Equality) and Fraternitè (Brotherhood) were betrayed by a long chain of violence and beheadings.

In the wicked smile of Dr. Cheros, readers will see Nazi officers who tortured prisoners for their own sadism.

In the novel, sadism is kept below the threshold of tolerability, but emerges as a subtle criticism against every form of oppression and violation of human rights.

“As a student of history – the author says in the book – I’ve observed that history does, in fact, repeat itself. This isn’t the first time in the history of humankind that a society has decided that a certain segment of its society was being oppressed and needed protection from another segment of that society. Our own nation’s overthrow of slavery is an obvious example. Hitler’s Nazi movement was another. In the first case, the evil of human slavery was brought to an end in a society; in another, the evil of genocide was birthed and carried out to exterminate the Jews, the Gypsies, and many others. There are many other historical examples on both sides of the equation. One lesson to be learned from this is that sometimes a society facing such circumstances makes the right choice, leading to justice and freedom, and sometimes the wrong choice is made, often leading to heinous crimes against humanity. As we, in our own times, face the increasing call to address issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion, where will our society end up? Will we make the right choices that lead to freedom and liberty, or will we be deceived by the so-called experts into embracing a path that simply helps the abused and the abusers switch places, continuing to do evil under the guise of justice?”

At the end, Egalitarius is an American tale that shocks, and leads us towards the discernment between what true equality and diversity really are. They are choices that must always be guided by respect and inclusion. And this theorem, in an electoral time, is a light in the midst of darkness.

About the Author

C.L. Wells is a Christian writer who lives with his family in Charleston County, South Carolina. His hobbies include writing Murder Mystery, YA, Paranormal, and Crime/Adventure Fiction, paddle boarding, hiking, and bicycling.

Author website: https://cwells.net/books/