As someone who loves to talk and write and read, Vox by Christina Dalcher was a nightmare read for me. In a near-future U.S. the alt-right has risen to power and put women in their place – in the home, serving men. Women and girls are fitted with counter bracelets trained to the wearer’s voice. […]
speculative fiction
Hobart could be the Australian capital by 2221 thanks to global warming
Average sea levels have risen around 23 centimetres since 1880 and that rate is accelerating, with another 3.2mm of rise each year in 2019. What if that rate continues to accelerate as the polar ice caps melt and the water heats up? Most of the eastern seaboard of Australia would be underwater, drowning Melbourne, Sydney […]
Review: Things in Jars, by Jess Kidd
Things is Jars is like a female Sherlock Holmes story. Except Watson is a half-naked ghost – or possibly a drug-induced hallucination – in boxing shorts who has very little to contribute to the investigation. London, 1863. Bridie Devine, the finest female detective of her age, is taking on her toughest case yet. Reeling from […]
Review: Daughter of Bad Times, by Rohan Wilson
Daughter of Bad Times reads less like dystopian fiction and more like future history. The writing style makes it feel like a slightly dramatised reenactment of entirely plausible events. The only kicker is that these particular events haven’t happened – yet. In 2075 the seas have risen and swallowed up tiny island-based nations like the […]
Review: The Book of Dreams, by Nina George
Nina George’s incredible new novel, The Book of Dreams, is about the dream world that exists between life and death. 13-year-old Sam sees the world in colours and can sense things most others can’t. He meets his father, Henri, for the first time in hospital. Henri is in a deep coma after being struck by a […]
Review: The Wall, by John Lanchester
In The Wall, John Lanchester has channelled modern society’s xenophobia and failure to act on climate change into a massive concrete structure surrounding a very different England. In the United Kingdom of the future, Brexit is the least of their worries. To keep out the rest of the world – ‘the Others’ – and the […]