Rainbows End Themes

The technology in Rainbows End is pretty much what's coming for us in the next few years-to-decades: self-driving cars, wearable computers (like Google Glass), internet everywhere, and (fingers cro...

In Rainbows End, it's hard to find people who aren't manipulating each other, even if they're manipulating each other for altruistic reasons. Miri is totally manipulating Robert Gu, but she's doing...

If you're like us, you've read lots of YA books where young heroes and heroines fight the old people in charge to figure out who they are. So it can be a shock to pick up Rainbows End, where just a...

In Rainbows End, there are many ways to communicate—though these ways don't always work out. Communication is very tied to "technology." And we don't just mean, "people use technology to silent m...

Nothing matters to Robert as much as his poetry—which he can no longer make. If he's sad about not being able to make poetry, then he's going to make everyone else around him miserable too. (See:...

There are lots of struggles for power going on in Rainbows End, starting with Alfred's struggle to mind control the world, and going all the way down to Robert's struggle to dominate his family. (S...

Community is a loose idea in Rainbows End, usually defined as a group of people you have something in common with. So there's family-community, though as we see with Robert and his family, this is...

In Rainbows End, identity is often about "power" and ability: in some sense, you are what you can do. Here, identity comes in two unique flavors: a) Who is Robert Gu now that he's back from the dea...

Change depends a lot on the eye of the beholder: if you liked the old way, then change is a terrible thing; but if the old way was only okay, then change can be pretty good. No matter how character...

Culture in Rainbows End often relies on or is shaped by technology; and even forms of culture that aren't changed themselves still are surrounded by new tech. For instance, take soccer, which is a...