Note: Wikipedia: It has been described as one of the most popular and controversial novels of the 18th century, one of the earliest works of science fiction, and the first work of utopian fiction set in the future rather than at a distant place in the present...Due to its controversial criticism of the Ancien Régime and portrayal of a secular future, the novel was at first not allowed to be published, appearing anonymously and being trafficked underground by smugglers and illicit booksellers. Despite being banned in France and Spain (including by the Holy See in 1773 and by the Spanish Inquisition in 1778, earning it a place in the Index Librorum Prohibitorum – it was also supposedly burned by the Spanish king himself) the novel quickly became popular in France.

Synopsis: Wikipedia: The novel describes the adventures of an unnamed man who, after engaging in a heated discussion with a philosopher friend about the injustices of Paris, falls asleep and finds himself in a Paris several centuries into the future. He wanders through the changed city, eventually ending up in the ruins of the Palace of Versailles. Mercier's hero notes everything that catches his fancy in this futuristic Paris. Public space and the justice system have been reorganized. Citizens' garb is comfortable and practical. Hospitals are effective and science-based. There are no monks, priests, prostitutes, beggars, dancing masters (i.e., dance teachers), pastry chefs, standing armies, slavery, arbitrary arrest, taxes, guilds, foreign trade, coffee, tea, or tobacco: such occupations, institutions, and products have been adjudged to be useless and immoral – as has much previously written literature, which has been willingly destroyed by the future librarians, who proudly display their library, reduced to a single room of only the most valuable works. Written on the eve of the French Revolution, the book describes a future secular, pacifist France that has been established through a peaceful revolution led by a "philosopher-king" who has set up a system resembling a parliamentary monarchy. The future utopian, egalitarian France is portrayed as having no religion and no military.