‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ does villainy so well its antagonists are part of our language: from the treacherous shopkeeper to the harsh genius O’Brian; from Big Brother to Winston himself as he willingly becomes the thing he hates. Prize for most hateful bastardy in ‘2084’ goes to the mysterious organisers of EJ Swift’s ‘The Endling Market’. Like […]
‘2084’ is a collection of specially commissioned short stories edited by George Sandison, set a century after the titular year of George Orwell’s seminal dystopian novel ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’. Since its publication, the themes, stories and language of Orwell’s novel have become part of popular culture in ways even its farsighted author could not have imagined. […]
‘Gilded Cage’ cleverly blends dystopian and fantasy tropes to create a gripping narrative that so perfectly captures the absurdity of contemporary political ‘reality’ it actually made me angry reading it at times. The idea is brilliantly simple: in a world analogous to ours, a minority of people with uncanny abilities called ‘Skills’ become the ruling […]
Alfred Hitchcock once described opening a film by following a car being made in an automated factory; at the end of the process, the boot opens to reveal a dead body. Hitch never made the film because the idea was too impossible even for him, so Adam Roberts has taken up the challenge and transferred […]
There’s a line in this gentle, rather lovely novel about an artist being able to create a whole picture with just a few details; an image that accurately reflects the entire narrative. While not an official sequel to ‘Sleeping Embers of an Ordinary Mind’, the author’s previous brilliantly-titled take on the many levels of human […]
Based on the cult science fiction novels, Diamond Roads is an interactive adventure story in which YOU choose the outcome. Join brilliantly resourceful Charity Freestone on an extraordinary mission through high-tech subterranean techno-paradise Diamond City in the year 2401. Click here to play
This extraordinary, big-hearted novel looks at life in and around the titular space port in Tel Aviv from a range of perspectives. Past, present and future blend in the sensuously-rendered ‘real’ world and the virtual environs of a post-Internet system called the Conversation. The book references many other science fiction writers, from the phrasing and […]
Joe is a private investigator tasked with finding Mike Longshott, author of the novel ‘Osama Bin Laden: Vigilante’ in this eerie book that perfectly nails the sense of dazed disconnect following the terrorist attacks in New York on 11 September 2001. As in ‘The Man in the High Castle’ ‘Osama’ (the book I’m reviewing, not […]
The first monthly Sci-Fi Session was held at Waterstone’s book shop in Gower Street, London on Monday 26 September 2017. Host Glyn Morgan (R) was joined by two science fiction authors whose work appears to be quite different: Adam Roberts (L) and Jeff Noon (centre). Adam is a lecturer in nineteenth century fiction at Royal […]
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