The Last Days of New Paris

May 23, 2016
Miéville (This Census-Taker) takes on the surrealists in this gritty and erudite fantasy. In 1941, a surrealist bomb exploded in Nazi-occupied Paris, unleashing thousands of manifs—physical manifestations of images taken from surrealist paintings. Some were merely whimsical; others were terrifying and dangerous. Now it’s 1950 and New Paris, as it’s called, is the epicenter of the continuing war. The chaotic city is fought over by Nazis and Parisians, both sides constantly bedeviled by the chaotic manifs. Worse still, the Nazis have made contact with hell and unleashed demons to aid their villainy. Thibault, a soldier in the surrealist cause, fights the Germans using the powers of chaos while attempting to monitor the manifs. While patrolling the city, he observes a manifestation of Carrington’s famous Amateur of Velocipedes and meets Sam, a woman with the unusual plan of photographing all of surrealist New Paris, despite the danger. Thibault soon discovers that Sam is someone much more powerful and dangerous than she seems. Knowledge of surrealist art is not necessary to enjoy this odd, action-filled tale, but it helps. An appendix explains the sources of the dozens of manifs mentioned in the story. Agent: Mic Cheetham, Mic Cheetham Associates Ltd. (U.K.).

July 1, 2016
Mieville's latest describes an alternative 1950s Paris transformed by the S-blast, an explosion of occult power that has brought the dreams and art of surrealism to life as manifs. Paris is cut off from the rest of the world by a still active Nazi Germany, which attempts to combat the manifs and Paris' surrealist underground with demonic allies. Thibaut, one of the last survivors of a surrealist resistance movement, attempts to solve the mystery of a new Nazi scheme involving the manifs while dealing with his own personal losses and traumas. Notes are included that cover the real-life source of the manifs, and Mieville readers may be reminded of the invasion of reflections that come to life in his novella, The Tain (2002), in a more benign, less apocalyptic manner. Inventive and engrossing, this novel shows why Mieville remains one of the best recent writers not only of weird fiction but of speculative fiction in general.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2016

In a Paris devastated by a bomb that distorted reality itself, the Nazis still patrol the streets in 1950. Yet they are far from the only danger to rebels like Thibault. The S-bomb, as it became known, set loose bizarre manifestations. These "manifs" might be plants that swallow airplanes or a woman merged with a bicycle. Thibault works on the side of the surrealists, monitoring the manifs while dodging Nazis and the demons they summon from hell. He encounters a photographer named Sam who is documenting the manifs of New Paris, but she appears to have a deeper purpose in France. As is typical for Mieville (Perdido Street Station) and his dizzying love of language, readers may want to have a dictionary on hand, and in this case an art history encyclopedia would not go amiss. While readers don't have to catch every surrealist reference as it occurs (there is an index to them at the back), some knowledge of the movement will probably enhance the reading experience. VERDICT For fans of the author's previous books and enthusiasts of speculative fiction with an intellectual bent. [See Prepub Alert, 2/21/16.]--MM

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2016

Winner of the Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, Arthur C. Clarke, British Fantasy, British Science Fiction, and Locus awards (many of those multiple times), Mieville here imagines that a Surrealist bomb has hit war-shattered Paris and turned it into a place of fantastical dreams and living nightmares. You can't deny that he's always original; look for lots of comics con promotions.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.