What have you been
reading this month?
“Older book, but
I’m working my way
through The Dirty
Streets Of Heaven
by Tad Williams.
Bobby Dollar kinda
reminds me of Harry
Dresden. With less
fi re. #BookClub”
@coffee_heathen“I’m over half way
through the new
@michaelcarey191
book, Someone
Like Me. It’s a page
turner! #BookClub”
@MrsHirez“Reading The Light
Between Worlds.
It’s such a brilliant
and simple idea, I
wish I’d thought of it.
#BookClub”
@gray_books“In to the fi nal 100
pages of Halcyon
by @Rio_Youers.
Simultaneously
wanting to fi nd
out how it plays
out and dreading
getting to the end.
Shaping up to be
one of my favourite
reads of the year.
#BookClub”
@ Rozza1210“I’m reading Sea Of
Rust by
@Massawyrm. Half
way through and
thoroughly enjoying
its take on AI.
#BookClub”
@CamJohnston“Just fi nished The
End Of Magic by
@markstay which
was excellent, and
have now returned
to Seveneves by
Neal Stephenson,
which I’m
thoroughly enjoying.
#BookClub”
@gavingsmith“Dreams Of The
Boardwalk by
Matthew Keville.
Really enjoying it.
Has a hint of Charles
de Lint about it.
#BookClub”
@andyangel44
Tell us what you’re reading
on Twitter or FacebookBOOK CLUB
Foe // A Brilliant VoidFoe
Better the devil
you know
Release 24 January
Writer Iain Reid
Publisher Simon and Schuster
Price £12.9 9
Nothing much has ever really
happened in Junior’s life. He works
at the local mill, he takes care of
his chickens, and he doesn’t really
understand his wife. He’s content
enough with his lot.
But then one day, an unfamiliar
car with bright green headlights
draws up outside his remote
farmhouse and delivers some
startling news: Junior has been
selected in a super-secret high-tech
lottery and will be one of the fi rst
people to go and live on a special
facility in space!
Unsurprisingly, he’s not
particularly excited about the
prospect of living in space, but
the good news is he won’t need
to go for a couple of years. In the
meantime, however, the company
responsible for the space facility
is going to work with him to
record his personality – because
while he’s away, his wife will
be kept company by an artifi cial
lifeform that has been meticulously
designed to be similar to him in
every way possible.
It’s a deeply creepy premise,
made all the more eerie by IainReid’s spare prose. Everything
unfolds from Junior’s perspective,
and he’s not a man of many words.
Details of the near future world
he and his wife Henrietta inhabit
are few and far between, drip-
fed into the narrative only when
absolutely necessary, and usually
in ways that raise more questions
than they answer.
Reid painstakingly weaves an
atmosphere of unease throughout
the book, so the reader becomes
as desperate for real answers as
Junior does, until his role in this
mysterious grand experiment is
horrifyingly revealed.
At just 260 pages, Foe is a
quick read, but the last few pages
demand a bit of extra attention.
Everything unfolds in the gaps
between the words at the end,
so skim read at your peril – the
actual ending is somehow both
happy and really, really scary,
depending on who your
sympathies ultimately lie with.
Sarah Lines
A Brilliant
Void
Revisiting
yesterday’s
tomorrows
Release Out now
Writer Various
Publisher Tramp Press
Price £12Think ‘classic science fi c t i o n ’
author and there’s a chance you
may not immediately think of those
hailing from Ireland.
You probably haven’t heard of
any of the 15 writers included in
this collection, either: William
Maginn, Fitz-James O’Brien,
Frances Power Cobbe, George
William Russell, Amelia Garland
Mears, Margaret Wolfe Hungerford,
Jane Barlow, LT Meade, Robert
Eustace, Clotilde Graves, Charlotte
McManus, Dorothy Macardle, Art
Ó Riain, Tarlach Ó Huid, and Cathal
Ó Sándair.But that’s precisely the point of
Jack Fennell’s book. This anthology
is intended to shine a light on some
forgotten works, and to demonstrate
that when it comes to imagining
the future, Irish storytellers could
conjure up new worlds with the best
of them.
The oldest story in the book dates
way back to 1837 while the newest
is from 1960, so even in this
relatively slim collection there’s a
huge range of cultural infl uences
and backgrounds.
It’s science fi ction in its purest
form, drawing on contemporary
scientifi c knowledge to extrapolate
into the future – whether that’s
imagining the effects of radiation on
human beings, befriending invisible
creatures through increasingly
powerful scientifi c instruments, or
even fi nding ways to peek into
alternate dimensions.
In his introduction, Fennell
explains that he had made a
conscious decision to include female
writers in this collection, even if their
work had actually previously been
classifi ed as fairy tales rather than
sci-fi. And that pays off brilliantly,
because some of the more interesting(and funny,) stories in the book are
by women.
It may have been a mistake to
include abridged novels as short
stories, however, because those tend
to feel a bit unfi nished.
Still, there’s a rich variety of ideas
on show here – fans of HG Wells
and Mary Shelley will get a real kick
out of this anthology.
Sarah Lines
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