The Tomorrow City by Monica Hughes :: Hughes Tomorrow City

The Tomorrow City by Monica Hughes   The plot of this book centres around deuce adolescents, David and Caro and an evil super data processor which aspires to control the futuristic city of Thompsonville. Dr. Henderson, Caros Father creates the "perfect" computing device designed to solve all of the problems of Thompsonville by gaining almost complete function of the city. The calculating machine then begins to make rash decisions of its own. It decides that humans are unable(predicate) of making decisions of there own and soon devises a method of imperious the minds of everyone in the city. Only two young people, Caro and David, are not manipulated by the computer. They band together and work out a strategy to disable the computer. The two make a daring infiltration of the building that the computer is located and after a traumatic episode in which Caro is blinded, the computer is destroyed and the city is returned to its previous state. The t heme of the book is to show that engineering science is not a perfect solution to the many problems faced by man. By using a product of engineering, the computer, and showing how it was supposed to be a perfect solution to the citys problems, yet it made a drab error in calculations, the author is saying that many problems faced by man cannot be solved by the use of technology. Technology vie a negative role in this book. The computer, the major aspect of technology used in this book, used its capabilities to immorally rule the citizens and the city of Thompsonville. The computer transmitted hypnotic signals through peoples T.V. sets and would use them to carry out its willing to ultimately control the city. It then discarded anything or anyone who were useless to its usage including the elderly and the sick. One of the major arguments that the author uses to emphasize the theme is the prodigious malfunctioning of the computer. It was designed to be flawless an d solve the numerous problems of the city. But, the computers limit is shown throughout the book to be poor. The methods in which it goes about solving the citys problems