A Very Literary Wiki
Advertisement

1996 novel by Alex Garland who went on to direct the excellent movies Ex Machina and Annihilation in the mid-late 2010s. Number 102 or something on the the BBC's The Big Read.

First read (June-July 2018)[]

18 07 05 The Beach

After watching Annihilation and finding out it was by the same guy who did Ex Machina I looked into him and discovered he'd written a book some years before that had some high praise; one review I saw called it the Lord of the Flies for a new generation or something. I decided it was worth giving it a read, bought it, and dived right in while I was still in the mood.

Took me about 10 days to read it, at a fairly slow pace. It was interesting, quite readable; the main character was quirky and funny and, knowing it had been compared to Lord of the Flies, I enjoyed the feeling of light suspense the whole way through. It took a while to get to that point and it ended quickly, so I feel a bit let down, but I would recommend it for a bit of entertainment.

1

Advertisement