Normal: A Novel - Softcover

Ellis, Warren

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0374534977 ISBN 13: 9780374534974

Publisher: FSG Originals, 2016

Synopsis

A smart, tight, provocative techno-thriller straight out of the very near future―by an iconic visionary writer

Some people call it "abyss gaze." Gaze into the abyss all day and the abyss will gaze into you.

There are two types of people who think professionally about the future: Foresight strategists are civil futurists who think about geoengineering and smart cities and ways to evade Our Coming Doom; strategic forecasters are spook futurists, who think about geopolitical upheaval and drone warfare and ways to prepare clients for Our Coming Doom. The former are paid by nonprofits and charities, the latter by global security groups and corporate think tanks.

For both types, if you're good at it, and you spend your days and nights doing it, then it's something you can't do for long. Depression sets in. Mental illness festers. And if the abyss gaze takes hold there's only one place to recover: Normal Head, in the wilds of Oregon, within the secure perimeter of an experimental forest.

When Adam Dearden, a foresight strategist, arrives at Normal Head, he is desperate to unplug and be immersed in sylvan silence. But then a patient goes missing from his locked bedroom, leaving nothing but a pile of insects in his wake. A staff investigation ensues; surveillance becomes total. As the mystery of the disappeared man unravels in Warren Ellis's Normal, Adam uncovers a conspiracy that calls into question the core principles of how and why we think about the future--and the past, and the now.

About this title

Review:

An Amazon Best Book of December 2016: Unpredictable and daringly written, Warren Ellis's compact novel Normal is a mind-blowing morsel of paranoia...or prescience. Institutionalized in the wilds of Oregon for a mental breakdown, foresight strategist Adam Dearden finds himself among former colleagues from around the globe who "gazed into the abyss" of the future, freaked out, and are now struggling to make peace—if they can—with what they believe to be humanity's and the planet's dark destiny. When the bizarre and impossible disappearance of a new inmate disrupts Adam's therapy before it begins, Adam is galvanized to exorcise his demons and solve the mystery before the future pounces on him and the other patients and destroys their last refuge. Chilling, bold, challenging, and dark, Normal is will hit the sweet spot for fans of David Mitchell, Jeff VanderMeer, or anyone who fears that the future is already here. --Adrian Liang, The Amazon Book Review

About the Author:

Warren Ellis is the author of FSG's first digital original, Dead Pig Collector; the New York Times bestselling novel Gun Machine; and the underground classic Crooked Little Vein. He is also the award-winning creator of a number of iconic, bestselling original graphic novels, including Red, Ministry of Space, Planetary, andTransmetropolitan, and has been behind some of the most successful reimaginings of mainstream comic superheroes, including the Fantastic Four and Iron Man. He has written extensively for Vice, Wired, and Reuters on technological and cultural matters, and is working on a nonfiction book about the future of cities for FSG Originals. He lives on the southeast coast of England.

About this edition

• Publisher: FSG Originals
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 0374534977
• ISBN 13: 9780374534974
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 160