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Yes, it's a book review. But don't let that put you off. It's a very very good book. Inquisitive soul that I am, I found out that originally the book was released in 300 word installments every day for about a year, at www.futureeden.com where you can read some chapters from the sequel, in first draft form of course. Anyway, like I said, it's a very very good book, and as you've probably guessed, it's science fiction. Again, don't let that put you off. It's almost as if the book doesn't want to be read, as the front cover is a chicken standing on some cardboard, in the middle of space woth some stars and a planet in the background. Well, despite the artwork, I recommend that you read it.
The quotes on the back are from Dr Spock, The Poultry Fancier's Gazette and Douglas Adams (who says "b*****d")...and really, it's a pretty good indication of what's to come. Quirky humour, and lots of Hitchhiker's Guide style characters and situations. It's 2287, and life on earth is 'lazily grinding to a halt'. This is explained by dwindling male fertility, explained away by humans as a result of that huge umbrella of a scapegoat, 'pollution'. In just one of the many enjoyable tangents Project Eden goes off on, we find out that Sex Police had to be set up, to make sure everyone had sex at least twice a day. It became such a chore that when the police finally did stop pestering everyone, intercourse was something people dreaded and avoided, rather than looked forward to and enjoyed. Anyway, one of the main protagonists is Jay, a sort of hybrid of Adam and Christ. He is The Chosen One, but he forms The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, Kay, from his rib. Well, to be more accurate, Ethel does. Ethel being the chicken plastered across the book's cover. Naturally, Ethel is an alien with powers incomprehensible to the feeble human brain. One day, when Jay decides to leave his luxurious penthouse apartment to go live in the country, his only remaining pet chicken begins talking to him (the other two decided to walk off the edge and fall to both their and the unfortunate people walking past the building's messy demises).
It transpires that while Jay may have just thought he was unlucky - his parents and sister abandoned him, he was left to fend for himself in a post-apocalyptic world which wasn't actually affected by an apocalypse at all - really, it has all been a test, devised by Ethel the chicken. Who, if you haven't guessed by now, created Earth and all it's wuvvery little creatures. Ethel was bottom of the class on her home planet, Megatron, and so she was sent off to take control of the last planet written on the Big Book of Planets, Earth. So, off she went with a pack of seeds and more than a drop of optimism, and the world as we know it was created. Unfortunately, she seems to be stuck on this wretched planet as nobody at Megatron really wants her back. So, in order to get her life back on track, as well as humanity's, she must head off on a quest with Jay, and Kay. And Fluffy, which is actually the all knowing Oracle, in the form of a goldfish. Ah yes, and Douglas, the son she lovingly creates with bits and bobs from cryogenically frozen people. Oh, and Merlin, the wizard of yore and father of Fluffy. And all the while looking over them, is the Blind Piano Tuner (come to think of it, my old school had a blind man who used to come in with his dog and tune the piano...hmmm...). The motley crew (not THE Motley Crew, obviously) set off in search of what we know only as The Perfect Hour. For sixty minutes, on October 18th, 2042, everything as perfect. No planets were at war, no countries getting cross with each other over boundries, not even petty squabbles about neighbours' plants growing over fences. The problem is, barely any humans noticed. Too wrapped up in fending for themselves. Well, one thing led to another, someone stepped on someone else's foot and everything had slid back into wild chaos once more.
Ethel the Chicken is determined to find who or what caused The Perfect Hour, in the hope of making him, her or it not only recreating those blissful moments, but in fact getting The Perfect Hour to become The Perfect Eternity. A lovely thought, for sure, but with a terribly dilapidated ship in the basement of Camelot with a heap of components missing their only way out, an evil Virus and very bad cockrel trying to make everything turn sour and plenty of mysteries to solve, such as the Tower of Dreams, the story will take up five books. But if the first installment is anything to go by, it'd be worth waiting a few years, maybe even worth waiting until 2287 to get the whole thing. It's the little things that are best: Ethel explaining how blind the human race is, searching for a deeper meaning within Stonehenge, when really it was just God's dark sense of humour revealing itsself. She scoffs at how nobody figured out that the pyramids were just roofs of great big buildings that sunk in the golden Egyptian sand. References to the Great Book Burnings of 2087 and the sudden 500% devaluation of all the stock markets everywhere and subsequent stockbroker witchhunts are joys to behold. Colin Thompson's book is one simply begging to made into a television series if not a fully fledged feature film. It's very funny, it's very engrossing and it's very very strange.
"Some time in 2003" can't come soon enough. I'll have to appease my mind with the preview chapters of Future Eden 2 on Thompson's website for now, but I hope that this praise has not fallen on deaf ears and that some of you do as I have, and get this wonderful book, by hook or by crook. Hehe.
Thanks for reading, and thanks even more if you read Future Eden.
El Blokey
The quotes on the back are from Dr Spock, The Poultry Fancier's Gazette and Douglas Adams (who says "b*****d")...and really, it's a pretty good indication of what's to come. Quirky humour, and lots of Hitchhiker's Guide style characters and situations. It's 2287, and life on earth is 'lazily grinding to a halt'. This is explained by dwindling male fertility, explained away by humans as a result of that huge umbrella of a scapegoat, 'pollution'. In just one of the many enjoyable tangents Project Eden goes off on, we find out that Sex Police had to be set up, to make sure everyone had sex at least twice a day. It became such a chore that when the police finally did stop pestering everyone, intercourse was something people dreaded and avoided, rather than looked forward to and enjoyed. Anyway, one of the main protagonists is Jay, a sort of hybrid of Adam and Christ. He is The Chosen One, but he forms The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, Kay, from his rib. Well, to be more accurate, Ethel does. Ethel being the chicken plastered across the book's cover. Naturally, Ethel is an alien with powers incomprehensible to the feeble human brain. One day, when Jay decides to leave his luxurious penthouse apartment to go live in the country, his only remaining pet chicken begins talking to him (the other two decided to walk off the edge and fall to both their and the unfortunate people walking past the building's messy demises).
It transpires that while Jay may have just thought he was unlucky - his parents and sister abandoned him, he was left to fend for himself in a post-apocalyptic world which wasn't actually affected by an apocalypse at all - really, it has all been a test, devised by Ethel the chicken. Who, if you haven't guessed by now, created Earth and all it's wuvvery little creatures. Ethel was bottom of the class on her home planet, Megatron, and so she was sent off to take control of the last planet written on the Big Book of Planets, Earth. So, off she went with a pack of seeds and more than a drop of optimism, and the world as we know it was created. Unfortunately, she seems to be stuck on this wretched planet as nobody at Megatron really wants her back. So, in order to get her life back on track, as well as humanity's, she must head off on a quest with Jay, and Kay. And Fluffy, which is actually the all knowing Oracle, in the form of a goldfish. Ah yes, and Douglas, the son she lovingly creates with bits and bobs from cryogenically frozen people. Oh, and Merlin, the wizard of yore and father of Fluffy. And all the while looking over them, is the Blind Piano Tuner (come to think of it, my old school had a blind man who used to come in with his dog and tune the piano...hmmm...). The motley crew (not THE Motley Crew, obviously) set off in search of what we know only as The Perfect Hour. For sixty minutes, on October 18th, 2042, everything as perfect. No planets were at war, no countries getting cross with each other over boundries, not even petty squabbles about neighbours' plants growing over fences. The problem is, barely any humans noticed. Too wrapped up in fending for themselves. Well, one thing led to another, someone stepped on someone else's foot and everything had slid back into wild chaos once more.
Ethel the Chicken is determined to find who or what caused The Perfect Hour, in the hope of making him, her or it not only recreating those blissful moments, but in fact getting The Perfect Hour to become The Perfect Eternity. A lovely thought, for sure, but with a terribly dilapidated ship in the basement of Camelot with a heap of components missing their only way out, an evil Virus and very bad cockrel trying to make everything turn sour and plenty of mysteries to solve, such as the Tower of Dreams, the story will take up five books. But if the first installment is anything to go by, it'd be worth waiting a few years, maybe even worth waiting until 2287 to get the whole thing. It's the little things that are best: Ethel explaining how blind the human race is, searching for a deeper meaning within Stonehenge, when really it was just God's dark sense of humour revealing itsself. She scoffs at how nobody figured out that the pyramids were just roofs of great big buildings that sunk in the golden Egyptian sand. References to the Great Book Burnings of 2087 and the sudden 500% devaluation of all the stock markets everywhere and subsequent stockbroker witchhunts are joys to behold. Colin Thompson's book is one simply begging to made into a television series if not a fully fledged feature film. It's very funny, it's very engrossing and it's very very strange.
"Some time in 2003" can't come soon enough. I'll have to appease my mind with the preview chapters of Future Eden 2 on Thompson's website for now, but I hope that this praise has not fallen on deaf ears and that some of you do as I have, and get this wonderful book, by hook or by crook. Hehe.
Thanks for reading, and thanks even more if you read Future Eden.
El Blokey
Belldandy wrote:
> Sorry but it sounds too much like Robert Rankin and all that style of
> writing...which I hate.
Well you probably wouldn't like it :-P
> Sorry but it sounds too much like Robert Rankin and all that style of
> writing...which I hate.
Well you probably wouldn't like it :-P
Sorry but it sounds too much like Robert Rankin and all that style of writing...which I hate.
Two best Scifi books I've read this year are "The Lure" - a tale of what could happen if aliens make contact - "The Trigger" - a story about avoiding conflict.
Best non-fiction I've read is "Fighting For The Future" by Ralph Peters - completely changed my outlook on loads of things. Also "The Real War" by Richard Nixon - despite his faults this guy predicted a heck of a lot of things that happened in his book.
~~Belldandy~~
Two best Scifi books I've read this year are "The Lure" - a tale of what could happen if aliens make contact - "The Trigger" - a story about avoiding conflict.
Best non-fiction I've read is "Fighting For The Future" by Ralph Peters - completely changed my outlook on loads of things. Also "The Real War" by Richard Nixon - despite his faults this guy predicted a heck of a lot of things that happened in his book.
~~Belldandy~~
Yes, it's a book review. But don't let that put you off. It's a very very good book. Inquisitive soul that I am, I found out that originally the book was released in 300 word installments every day for about a year, at www.futureeden.com where you can read some chapters from the sequel, in first draft form of course. Anyway, like I said, it's a very very good book, and as you've probably guessed, it's science fiction. Again, don't let that put you off. It's almost as if the book doesn't want to be read, as the front cover is a chicken standing on some cardboard, in the middle of space woth some stars and a planet in the background. Well, despite the artwork, I recommend that you read it.
The quotes on the back are from Dr Spock, The Poultry Fancier's Gazette and Douglas Adams (who says "b*****d")...and really, it's a pretty good indication of what's to come. Quirky humour, and lots of Hitchhiker's Guide style characters and situations. It's 2287, and life on earth is 'lazily grinding to a halt'. This is explained by dwindling male fertility, explained away by humans as a result of that huge umbrella of a scapegoat, 'pollution'. In just one of the many enjoyable tangents Project Eden goes off on, we find out that Sex Police had to be set up, to make sure everyone had sex at least twice a day. It became such a chore that when the police finally did stop pestering everyone, intercourse was something people dreaded and avoided, rather than looked forward to and enjoyed. Anyway, one of the main protagonists is Jay, a sort of hybrid of Adam and Christ. He is The Chosen One, but he forms The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, Kay, from his rib. Well, to be more accurate, Ethel does. Ethel being the chicken plastered across the book's cover. Naturally, Ethel is an alien with powers incomprehensible to the feeble human brain. One day, when Jay decides to leave his luxurious penthouse apartment to go live in the country, his only remaining pet chicken begins talking to him (the other two decided to walk off the edge and fall to both their and the unfortunate people walking past the building's messy demises).
It transpires that while Jay may have just thought he was unlucky - his parents and sister abandoned him, he was left to fend for himself in a post-apocalyptic world which wasn't actually affected by an apocalypse at all - really, it has all been a test, devised by Ethel the chicken. Who, if you haven't guessed by now, created Earth and all it's wuvvery little creatures. Ethel was bottom of the class on her home planet, Megatron, and so she was sent off to take control of the last planet written on the Big Book of Planets, Earth. So, off she went with a pack of seeds and more than a drop of optimism, and the world as we know it was created. Unfortunately, she seems to be stuck on this wretched planet as nobody at Megatron really wants her back. So, in order to get her life back on track, as well as humanity's, she must head off on a quest with Jay, and Kay. And Fluffy, which is actually the all knowing Oracle, in the form of a goldfish. Ah yes, and Douglas, the son she lovingly creates with bits and bobs from cryogenically frozen people. Oh, and Merlin, the wizard of yore and father of Fluffy. And all the while looking over them, is the Blind Piano Tuner (come to think of it, my old school had a blind man who used to come in with his dog and tune the piano...hmmm...). The motley crew (not THE Motley Crew, obviously) set off in search of what we know only as The Perfect Hour. For sixty minutes, on October 18th, 2042, everything as perfect. No planets were at war, no countries getting cross with each other over boundries, not even petty squabbles about neighbours' plants growing over fences. The problem is, barely any humans noticed. Too wrapped up in fending for themselves. Well, one thing led to another, someone stepped on someone else's foot and everything had slid back into wild chaos once more.
Ethel the Chicken is determined to find who or what caused The Perfect Hour, in the hope of making him, her or it not only recreating those blissful moments, but in fact getting The Perfect Hour to become The Perfect Eternity. A lovely thought, for sure, but with a terribly dilapidated ship in the basement of Camelot with a heap of components missing their only way out, an evil Virus and very bad cockrel trying to make everything turn sour and plenty of mysteries to solve, such as the Tower of Dreams, the story will take up five books. But if the first installment is anything to go by, it'd be worth waiting a few years, maybe even worth waiting until 2287 to get the whole thing. It's the little things that are best: Ethel explaining how blind the human race is, searching for a deeper meaning within Stonehenge, when really it was just God's dark sense of humour revealing itsself. She scoffs at how nobody figured out that the pyramids were just roofs of great big buildings that sunk in the golden Egyptian sand. References to the Great Book Burnings of 2087 and the sudden 500% devaluation of all the stock markets everywhere and subsequent stockbroker witchhunts are joys to behold. Colin Thompson's book is one simply begging to made into a television series if not a fully fledged feature film. It's very funny, it's very engrossing and it's very very strange.
"Some time in 2003" can't come soon enough. I'll have to appease my mind with the preview chapters of Future Eden 2 on Thompson's website for now, but I hope that this praise has not fallen on deaf ears and that some of you do as I have, and get this wonderful book, by hook or by crook. Hehe.
Thanks for reading, and thanks even more if you read Future Eden.
El Blokey
The quotes on the back are from Dr Spock, The Poultry Fancier's Gazette and Douglas Adams (who says "b*****d")...and really, it's a pretty good indication of what's to come. Quirky humour, and lots of Hitchhiker's Guide style characters and situations. It's 2287, and life on earth is 'lazily grinding to a halt'. This is explained by dwindling male fertility, explained away by humans as a result of that huge umbrella of a scapegoat, 'pollution'. In just one of the many enjoyable tangents Project Eden goes off on, we find out that Sex Police had to be set up, to make sure everyone had sex at least twice a day. It became such a chore that when the police finally did stop pestering everyone, intercourse was something people dreaded and avoided, rather than looked forward to and enjoyed. Anyway, one of the main protagonists is Jay, a sort of hybrid of Adam and Christ. He is The Chosen One, but he forms The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, Kay, from his rib. Well, to be more accurate, Ethel does. Ethel being the chicken plastered across the book's cover. Naturally, Ethel is an alien with powers incomprehensible to the feeble human brain. One day, when Jay decides to leave his luxurious penthouse apartment to go live in the country, his only remaining pet chicken begins talking to him (the other two decided to walk off the edge and fall to both their and the unfortunate people walking past the building's messy demises).
It transpires that while Jay may have just thought he was unlucky - his parents and sister abandoned him, he was left to fend for himself in a post-apocalyptic world which wasn't actually affected by an apocalypse at all - really, it has all been a test, devised by Ethel the chicken. Who, if you haven't guessed by now, created Earth and all it's wuvvery little creatures. Ethel was bottom of the class on her home planet, Megatron, and so she was sent off to take control of the last planet written on the Big Book of Planets, Earth. So, off she went with a pack of seeds and more than a drop of optimism, and the world as we know it was created. Unfortunately, she seems to be stuck on this wretched planet as nobody at Megatron really wants her back. So, in order to get her life back on track, as well as humanity's, she must head off on a quest with Jay, and Kay. And Fluffy, which is actually the all knowing Oracle, in the form of a goldfish. Ah yes, and Douglas, the son she lovingly creates with bits and bobs from cryogenically frozen people. Oh, and Merlin, the wizard of yore and father of Fluffy. And all the while looking over them, is the Blind Piano Tuner (come to think of it, my old school had a blind man who used to come in with his dog and tune the piano...hmmm...). The motley crew (not THE Motley Crew, obviously) set off in search of what we know only as The Perfect Hour. For sixty minutes, on October 18th, 2042, everything as perfect. No planets were at war, no countries getting cross with each other over boundries, not even petty squabbles about neighbours' plants growing over fences. The problem is, barely any humans noticed. Too wrapped up in fending for themselves. Well, one thing led to another, someone stepped on someone else's foot and everything had slid back into wild chaos once more.
Ethel the Chicken is determined to find who or what caused The Perfect Hour, in the hope of making him, her or it not only recreating those blissful moments, but in fact getting The Perfect Hour to become The Perfect Eternity. A lovely thought, for sure, but with a terribly dilapidated ship in the basement of Camelot with a heap of components missing their only way out, an evil Virus and very bad cockrel trying to make everything turn sour and plenty of mysteries to solve, such as the Tower of Dreams, the story will take up five books. But if the first installment is anything to go by, it'd be worth waiting a few years, maybe even worth waiting until 2287 to get the whole thing. It's the little things that are best: Ethel explaining how blind the human race is, searching for a deeper meaning within Stonehenge, when really it was just God's dark sense of humour revealing itsself. She scoffs at how nobody figured out that the pyramids were just roofs of great big buildings that sunk in the golden Egyptian sand. References to the Great Book Burnings of 2087 and the sudden 500% devaluation of all the stock markets everywhere and subsequent stockbroker witchhunts are joys to behold. Colin Thompson's book is one simply begging to made into a television series if not a fully fledged feature film. It's very funny, it's very engrossing and it's very very strange.
"Some time in 2003" can't come soon enough. I'll have to appease my mind with the preview chapters of Future Eden 2 on Thompson's website for now, but I hope that this praise has not fallen on deaf ears and that some of you do as I have, and get this wonderful book, by hook or by crook. Hehe.
Thanks for reading, and thanks even more if you read Future Eden.
El Blokey