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Content snapshot
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Violence
Some
Some violence as the civilization-ending situation and the novel's villain create physical danger
Language
Barely any
Formal literary prose in Ballard's cool and estranging register
Sexual Content
Some
Some adult content in the surviving community
Substance Use
Barely any
Some drinking in the remaining civilization
Emotional Intensity
Very heavy
Extreme psychological intensity — Ballard's subject is the human desire to regress, to dissolve into pre-conscious states, to embrace entropy — creating one of the most psychologically demanding novels in British SF
What this book is about
J.G. Ballard's second novel is set in a future London submerged by flooding, where a scientific team monitors the tropical lagoons that have replaced civilization. Dr. Kerans begins dreaming of the pre-human past and is drawn toward a terrifying psychological regression. Ballard writes with extraordinary strangeness; the novel is as much a portrait of entropy and the unconscious as it is science fiction. Adult content and Ballard's distinctive psychological darkness throughout. A foundational work of British literary SF.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
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