The Junkmakers

The story follows Wendell Hart, a machine tender whose society stages a decennial ritual in which households publicly destroy obsolete appliances and robots to ritualize shortage and stimulate work. Disturbed by this enforced waste, he researches planned obsolescence and conspicuous consumption in restricted archives, drifts into an underground Saver movement, and struggles with the cultural and legal pressures that demand participation. When the Festival arrives, he must confront the fate of his prized household robot Eric and the communal compulsion to sacrifice functional machines, exposing tensions between technological affection, social ritual, and state-sanctioned consumption.