Publsihed by Tor.com on June 14, 2022
January 15 is Universal Basic Income Day, the holiday when everyone collects their money. UBI was born in “an extraordinary act of political will” after the world reached the brink of nuclear war. People were so happy to be alive, Janelle explains, that they decided to save the world, settling on UBI as the solution. Maybe the concept is Rachel Swirsky’s reaction to pandemic payments made to people who didn’t need them. The book’s premise doesn’t necessarily make sense (the link between nuclear annihilation and a universal income is less than clear), but it provides the foundation for the story that follows.
Janelle supported the idea of making things better, but now realizes that “making things better doesn’t always work.” Almost as soon as UBI was enacted, the wealthy began looking for ways to take it away from those who need it the most, particularly if they have dark skin (like Janelle) or are naturalized citizens. Inevitably, some of those who could have used the money productively spend it on drugs or cults. Janelle’s sister believes reparations would be more just than UBI. One of Swirksy’s points seems to be that society can help people but can’t force people to help themselves.
Unfortunately, Swirsky seems to have been more interested in making points than in telling a cohesive story. January Fifteenth follows four sets of characters who are linked only by the fact that their stories unfold on UBI Day.
Janelle and Nevaeh are sisters conducting interviews for aggregators, gathering reactions to UBI Day. They ask school kids how their parents will spend their money. They enter banks and talk to people who are depositing their checks. They talk to shoppers in malls. Some people blame UBI for breeding laziness and encouraging people not to get jobs, but nobody seems to be refusing the money. Apart from offering transcripts of other people’s reactions to UBI, the chapters that follow Janelle and Nevaeh focus on their sibling relationship, how they were raised, and how Janelle is raising Neveah now that their parents are dead.
Hannah is having issues with her violent ex-wife. They have two sons to whom ex-wife Abigail gave birth, but Hannah is keeping them in hiding with the help of an older woman who has military training and doesn’t take Abigail’s crap.
Sarah is a pregnant fifteen-year-old who needs to see mainstream Mormon social workers. Sarah is married to a non-mainstream husband whose other wives are regarded as Sarah’s sister-wives. Sarah doesn’t appreciate being judged by the mainstreams.
Olivia is partying with other students from elite colleges on UBI Day. Rich people are competing to waste their UBI money creatively, but Olivia hasn’t entered the contest. She’s tripping on something similar to Ecstasy while two other party goers, a male and a female, argue about whether Olivia consented to the sex she had with the male.
The permutations of gender play a strong background role in the novel. Nevaeh changed her birth-assigned gender. Janelle is uncomfortable interviewing children because some parents become upset when she asks kids about their preferred gender pronouns. (To Janelle, the question is only polite.) Janelle and Nevaeh argue about teen slang for gender, which has broadened considerably in this near future. Janelle prefers traditional terms like trans, cis, and nonbinary, but traditional is the last thing that language ever wants to be.
Class is another social issue that receives prominent attention. Wealthy people euphemistically refer to the poor as “the mobile class.” Janelle has heard rumors that Native women have been told they must be sterilized to collect their UBI.
The story’s emphasis on various social issues — rape and domestic violence, race and class and gender, oppression in its many forms, bulimia, the impact of religious cults on teenage girls, social welfare — deprives the novel of focus. The story is scattered through the four sets of characters who seemingly exist only to allow Swirksy to check as many social-issue boxes as she could, I’m all in favor of science fiction that asks how social issues might be addressed in the future, but none of the issues here benefit from the deep dive that sf at its best provides.
Swirsky’s larger theme seems to be that attempts to solve problems will inevitably create new problems. Government services were cut to pay for UBI, with devastating impacts for people who lost in-home care and students who no longer receive free lunches. Nor does UBI solve other problems, including collapsing mines in Appalachia and the influx of climate refugees. The novella-length book is a long walk to illustrate the obvious conclusion that no solution to any social problem will be perfect. While characters offer interesting and diverse opinions that might spark book club discussions, the novella as a whole lacks resolution and never coheres into a work that is larger than its parts.
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