Thursday 9 May 2013

SCIENCE FICTION/FANTASY REVIEW: The Fictional Man - Al Ewing

Release Date: 09/05/13
Publisher:  Solaris

SYNOPSIS:

One of the most exciting new voices in British fiction has written an extraordinary novel. In an L.A. where fictional characters are cloned into living beings, the author Niles Golan is on the verge of hitting the big-time - if he can just stay on top of reality long enough to make it. Hollywood: Niles Golan is writing a remake of a campclassic spy movie. The studio has plans for a franchise, so rather than hiring an actor, the protagonist will be 'translated' into a cloned human body. It s common practice Niles' therapist is a Fictional. So is his best friend. So (maybe) is the woman in the bar he can t stop staring at. Fictionals are a part of daily life now, especially in LA. In fact, it's getting hard to tell who's a Fictional and who's not...


REVIEW:

Science Fiction, in the classical sense are books that are always looking for ways to challenge the reader and make them think whether it’s a question about things that are greater than us or questioning our own choices in the greater scheme of things, so when Al’s latest book landed I was more than intrigued to see how he would play the characters out in not only a world that is different from our own but one that generated a new culture for the reader.

What occurs within is a story that questions our abilities to choose, would we want to be greater than the sum of our parts or would we chose to have others make our choices for us and what does it mean to be human?

Al’s book is interesting, has some solid twists but to be frank I felt that it was a book that would have sat better as a novella rather than a full novel as part of the script felt a lot like filler rather than giving it any real direction. Don’t get me wrong it was something that distracted the reader whilst Al questioned you about your beliefs but all round I felt it would have been punchier had a lot of the story search been avoided.



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