The Men
Published on 2. June 2022
Book
Hardback
272 pages
978-1-78378-781-4 (ISBN)
Description
*Selected for 2022 previews by the Observer, the Guardian, the Daily Mail, & the Irish Times*
'Intriguingly strange' The Bookseller, Editor's Choice
In a single moment, in every part of the world, every person with an Y chromosome vanishes: lovers, children, parents - even foetuses from the womb.
Jane Pearson wakes on a mountainside the next morning to find her husband and son missing from their tent. Frantic and grieving, she sets out to find the one person she thinks can help - Evangelyne Moreau, the brilliant, charismatic leader of the Commensalist Party of America, whose heart she broke many years before.
While Jane searches for those she has lost, a radically different society emerges, one that seems - at first - to be suddenly, blissfully safer than what came before. And then The Men appears online: uncanny video footage that shows the missing being herded through bizarre, otherworldly landscapes. Is it a hoax, or could The Men hold the key to bringing back those who were lost? And if so, what might be the cost?
From the author of The Heavens, The Men is a gripping, beautiful, and disquieting novel of impossible sacrifices that asks: what might we be prepared to give up to create a better world?
'Intriguingly strange' The Bookseller, Editor's Choice
In a single moment, in every part of the world, every person with an Y chromosome vanishes: lovers, children, parents - even foetuses from the womb.
Jane Pearson wakes on a mountainside the next morning to find her husband and son missing from their tent. Frantic and grieving, she sets out to find the one person she thinks can help - Evangelyne Moreau, the brilliant, charismatic leader of the Commensalist Party of America, whose heart she broke many years before.
While Jane searches for those she has lost, a radically different society emerges, one that seems - at first - to be suddenly, blissfully safer than what came before. And then The Men appears online: uncanny video footage that shows the missing being herded through bizarre, otherworldly landscapes. Is it a hoax, or could The Men hold the key to bringing back those who were lost? And if so, what might be the cost?
From the author of The Heavens, The Men is a gripping, beautiful, and disquieting novel of impossible sacrifices that asks: what might we be prepared to give up to create a better world?
Reviews / Votes
A dazzling work of speculative fiction * Observer * Heart-breaking. The Men imagines a better world and what we might have to sacrifice to get there, and, at the same time, it's a brilliantly constructed sci-fi thriller, with a premise that hooks you in with a horrifying grip. I loved it * Bridget Collins * 'Almost supernaturally propulsive, sometimes very beautiful... there are strange things here I am unlikely to forget. Sandra Newman is a genius' * Sarah Perry, author of Melmouth * Superb. A novel of hypnotic power and breadth from one of the most supple, dynamic voices around. Newman's talents never fail to impress me * Irenosen Okojie, author of Butterfly Fish * Explosive... Dazzling and lyrical... Truly spectacular * Literary Review * A gripping, haunting novel that miraculously swerves both cheap misandry and the lazy pieties of contemporary rectitude * Spectator * Propulsive * i Paper * The Men really intrigues and disturbs... * Guardian * Compelling and enjoyable * Telegraph * Sandra Newman's fiction is characterised by audacious conceits, utopian thinking and apocalyptic fantasies * Observer * Newman hooks you in with her intriguing premise, asking unnerving questions about our present, and future * Stylist, Book List * A tale of white guilt, climate inaction and the gravitational pull of grief; of what - or who - we are willing to sacrifice to stay comfortable * TLS *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 135 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
382 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78378-781-4 (9781783787814)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Person
Sandra Newman is the author of the Bailey's Prize-longlisted The Country of Ice Cream Star, The Only Good Thing Anyone Has Ever Done (shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award), Cake, and The Heavens, as well as the memoir Changeling and the hugely successful How Not to Write a Novel. She is a graduate of the University of East Anglia Creative writing programme and now lives in New York.