Description
WINNER OF THE BSFA AWARD FOR BEST NOVEL
Jack Glass is the murderer. We know this from the start. Yet as this extraordinary novel tells the story of three murders committed by Glass the reader will be surprised to find out that it was Glass who was the killer and how he did it. And by the end of the book our sympathies for the killer are fully engaged.
Riffing on the tropes of crime fiction (the country house murder, the locked room mystery) and imbued with the feel of golden age SF, JACK GLASS is another bravura performance from Roberts. Whatever games he plays with the genre, whatever questions he asks of the reader, Roberts never loses sight of the need to entertain and JACK GLASS has some wonderfully gruesome moments, is built around three gripping HowDunnits and comes with liberal doses of sly humour.
Roberts invites us to have fun and tricks us into thinking about both crime and SF via a beautifully structured novel set in a society whose depiction challanges notions of crime, punishment, power and freedom. It is an extraordinary novel.
Golden Age SF meets Golden Age Crime from the author Kim Stanley Robinson thinks should have won the Booker.
About the Author
Adam Roberts is Professor of 19th-century literature at London University. His novel JACK GLASS won the BSFA AWARD for Best Novel and three of his novels have been shortlisted for the ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD. He maintains at least three separate critical blogs. He has also published a number of academic works on both 19th-century poetry and SF.
Reviews
A smart and ingenius writer * Christopher Priest *
Clever, inventive and above all a fantastic read * SF Book *
Perfectly plotted, winningly worded, and as rewarding, despite everything, as anything you're apt to read this year, this trifecta of golden age goodness is yet another example of Adam Roberts' tremendous talents * Tor.com *
Awards
Winner of British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novel 2013 (UK) and John W Campbell Award 2013 (UK).
Book Information
ISBN 9780575127647
Author Adam Roberts
Format Paperback
Page Count 384
Imprint Gollancz
Publisher Orion Publishing Co
Weight(grams) 311g
Dimensions(mm) 197mm * 160mm * 25mm