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The Ministry for the FutureBook

by Kim Stanley Robinson

Who uses, recommends or left The Ministry for the Future, in their own words: each a verbatim quote with a link to where it was said.

2 people

Astrophysicist at Barnard College; wrote Black Hole Blues and How the Universe Got Its Spots, and directs sciences at Pioneer Works.
loved

I fully imagine that his Ministry for the Future—which opens with the most harrowing, unrelenting depiction of a deadly heatwave—will be the warning and plea needed for the world to actually create a Ministry for the Future.

Her Higher Dimensions newsletter roundup of summer video recommendations from her Pioneer Works event series

2026-08-18·jannalevin.substack.com ↗

Co-founder of Microsoft and the Gates Foundation; publishes book reviews and essays at Gates Notes.
loved

The Ministry for the Future does a better job than any other book I’ve read of playing out, in a dramatic but realistic way, how high temperatures can literally kill people.

Gates's 2022 summer reading list entry on Kim Stanley Robinson's climate novel.

2022-06-06·gatesnotes.com ↗

Every entry is a verbatim quote and a link to the public post it came from. Nothing is paraphrased. If it is not on record somewhere public, it is not here.

The verdict is what they actually said: loved and liked are explicit; recommended means they told others to get it; uses means they only say they use it; read is a book on their public shelf with no verdict; mixed and disliked are kept too.

A dashed affiliate link, sponsored or their own label means the post disclosed a relationship. It is shown, never hidden.

The shading behind a date shows how dated a recommendation is for its kind of thing.

The shading behind a date shows how dated a recommendation is, for its kind of thing. Fully green is recent. It drains a quarter at a time as the post gets older, and is empty once it reads as dated.

What counts as old depends on the thing. A laptop praised four years ago has been replaced twice; a book loved twenty years ago is probably still loved. The shading is gone after about:

Stripes mean the post carries no date and the date shown is an estimate. No date at all, no shading.