A SUPERIOR SPECTRE
Angela Meyer (Saraband)
A Superior Spectre may be Angela Meyer’s first offering, but it’s two entwined stories: one a historical drama, and the other a dystopian sci-fi in a similar vein to The Handmaid’s Tale. Like all great dystopian novels, it’s intensely political, with an overarching focus on social freedom; one protagonist faces an overbearing draconian society that physically limits where she can go and who she can love, while the other relieves himself from his own isolation by parasitically and patriarchally infringing on the other. It’s regrettable that juggling two contrasting stories sees interesting side themes, like which desires are acceptable, fail to reach real fruition, and the dystopian world that’s alluded to is sparsely developed. Nevertheless, it’s consistently a thought-provoking and well-written stab at one of literature’s bleakest genres.
Price: £8.99. Info: www.saraband.net
words Alison Powell