The Iron Heel is a dystopian and political novel in the form of science fiction[1] by American writer Jack London, first published in 1908.

Conservatives feel alarmed and threatened by this prospect, to the point of seizing power and establishing a brutal dictatorship in order to avert it.

The novel is told via the framing device of a manuscript found centuries after the action takes place and footnotes by a scholar, Anthony Meredith, circa 2600 AD or 419 B.O.M.

Canada, Mexico, and Cuba form their own Oligarchies and are aligned with the U.S. (London remains silent as to events transpiring in the rest of the world.)

The Oligarchy is the largest monopoly of trusts (or robber barons) who manage to squeeze out the middle class by bankrupting most small to mid-sized business as well as reducing all farmers to effective serfdom.

[citation needed] The book is unusual among London's writings (and in the literature of the time in general) in being a first-person narrative of a woman protagonist written by a man.

"[5] Specifically, Orwell's protagonist Winston Smith, like London's Avis Everhard, keeps a diary where he writes down his rebellious thoughts and experiences.

[6] Granville Hicks, reviewing Kurt Vonnegut's Player Piano, was reminded of The Iron Heel: "we are taken into the future and shown an America ruled by a tiny oligarchy, and here too there is a revolt that fails.