Ballard made sweltering crocodile-infested tropical lagoons out of flooded central London; Self sticks to a temperate climate where names change but animals and plants don’t, with oaks rebranded as crinkleleaf and great skuas renamed bonkergulls. All in all, it was as annoying as the first chapters hinted to (which is ok) and a bit less pretentious than would appear from its opening (which is a pity). It's dense, difficult, funny, and like Burgess' Clockwork Orange, needs a dictionary in the back for the words from Symun's world. His life unravels around him as a tale of urban dysfunction, but his Knowledge of London helps somehow.

I thank myself occasionally about picking this one in french for a change, because I can't imagine how tough it would be for me to read it in english - considering that it's already hard in my own language. We are unable to deal with any claims after this period, unless in exceptional circumstances, which will be dealt with on a case by case basis, and at at our own discretion. The wrong side of 40 and going to seed, balding and divorced from ‘Chelle, a woman he married out of a sense of guilt after getting her knocked up on a one night stand.It is forbidden to copy anything for publication elsewhere without written permission from the copyright holder. It was not a smooth process, and some catastrophic ice sheet collapses will have triggered local tsunami that Dave brandishes a shotgun but is fatally injured in a struggle with the men, who arrange the scene to make the death look like suicide – an arrangement that is readily believed by Phyllis and the police. Zaphod Beeblebrox was eager to “meet the meat” which suggested which cuts of itself would be most tasty and then, before popping off to slaughter itself, assured the traumatised Arthur Dent that “I’ll be very humane.

Hundreds of years into the future, people discover a ranting book written by a disturbed present-day bigot, and model their lives around the ‘truths’ it contains. I recommend it; it is an engrossing read although the parts that take place 500 from now are somewhat difficult to read and it takes a bit to get the hang of the futuristic English language. Additionally, aspects of Dave's life are ritualised into legal requirements: such as "changeover", the act of custodial exchange of children, and parents being forced to live apart even though they would be happy living together.

The book which forms the basis of their religion and all in the land of Ing, describes a rather harsh, separated, mysogynist way of being, and it's easy to see how the most fervent fanatics can excuse such behaviour all in the name of (in this case) Dave.

The rest of London is flooded, and Dave's book has been discovered several hundred years ago before, and somehow, the ravings of a depressed cabbie have spawned an entire religion. It's certainly not an easy book to read to begin with and you have to work quite hard to understand some of the language used in the future chapters as it is a mixture of phonetic Cockney, taxi-driver terminology and the language adopted by the imaginary society that have embraced Dave's doctrine. com will use the information you provide on this form to keep in touch with you and to provide updates about World Book Day.Over the course of a further five hundred years the book has become the central religious text for the Kingdom of Ing hunkering on the archipelago that climate change floods have made of central and southern England. If this isn't going to be confusing enough, both stories are written with a phonetic approach to dialogue. The present-day story tells the tale of a London cabbie, Dave Rudman, a somewhat pathetic character who it seems you are to both pity and feel disgusted by, as he meets a woman, has a son, gets divorced, and has a total mental breakdown. Many people here and elsewhere have complained about the language being too difficult to understand, I however found it to be very entertaining.