Lord of the World : Vertvolta Press : 9781609441036 : 1609441036 : 25 Mar 2019 : Science fiction as a genre of literature was not differentiated in the minds of publishers from fantasy tales until nearly the middle of the Twentieth Century--and that sentence may inflame affectionados of the form but so be it. Is Edward Bellamy's Looking Backwards a political fantasy or science fiction dealing with politics and economics? Good question. The answer is in the mind of the reader. In the mind of the author of Lord of the World brewed a saga dealing with an uncertain future date when the world is split into warring factions of radical socialists, each in control of one or more continents. Benson calls them communists but he does not have the Leninist-Stalinist-Maoist type communists in mind, just utopian socialists who have abolished most aspect of a capitalist society but retained a semblance of representative--if authoritarian--government. Throughout the world there is universal health ca