Oryx and Crake (Hardcover)

Jimmy's past is an all-too-recognisable future of gated communities living in fear of the 'pleeblands' outside, of genetic engineering on demand turned to the gratification of our shallowest desires, and of entertainment on tap from internet porn and destructive wargames simulating extinction. His present is a world which has lost all familiar features and where he himself faces extinction, but has also been reinvented as the source of creation myths for a community of the Children of Crake, on the one hand monstrous freaks of genetically redesigned humans, herbivorous and with added features such as the sexual displays of baboons and the purring of cats, but minus impulses such as lust and aggression. These creatures begin more and more to appear like the noble savages, the ideal primitive people, described by writers such as Montaigne, and Jimmy is caught in a web of confusion as to his place with them -to protect or to resent, as he is drawn into the role of the semi-divine, wholly alien storyteller and shaman explaining their beginnings and their place in this unrecognisable world around them: imagine Lord of the Flies told from the point of view of the pig's head on the stick.

This is not a novel that gives easy answers and, as with the Handmaid's Tale, we are left with an ending of multiple possibilities. A brilliant, unforgettable read.

Oryx and Crake is the story of Snowman, the last man on earth. Quite how he got to be, living in a tree with a sheet wrapped round him for protection, surviving on rotting fruit and rain water collected in beer bottles, as we first encounter him in chapter one, gradually unravels. Atwood mixes the present with the past seamlessly as it transpires that Snowman, formerly Jimmy, grew up closeted in a scientific compound with dysfunctional parents more intent on splicing breeds of animals to create new species, than nurturing their son. And so Jimmy meets Crake. Crake becomes his mentor but still fails to offer him the emotional support Jimmy craves.

Atwood develops Jimmy and Crake, and every other character, on cold hard lines. They obsess in the seedy world of internet pornographic voyeurism gone mad - it is here they first see the abused child Oryx . There's a mirror to the detached stark work of the unwavering science, the happy pills, the spliced new breeds, the high security corporate compounds to keep out the anarchistic and low life pleebland dwellers - or the "ordinary" people.

It is dealt with by Atwood's deft touch and managing to just toe behind the line of sensationalism and the graphic. A hint at the stuff of nightmares, a civilisation and a world being destroyed in every sense.

In the main, Oryx and Crake deals with some (less than) grand themes. And although it sometimes feels like we are merely being treated to some heady headlines with a lack of depth in places, this was surely Atwood's raison d'etre. Finishing the book one is left with a smack of sadness and little hope for the future as it is developing. It is nonetheless a rewarding and stimulating read. Atwood never fails to deliver eloquent and captivating prose and in Oryx and Crake she's pulled it off again.

This is a book that grabs your attention from the very first sentence and never lets go, dragging you further and further into the nightmare world of an all to possible near future. Who is the Snowman? Why is he alone? Who/what are the Children of Crake? The answers Atwood reveals slowly, as she describes a world not unlike our own - apart from the pigoons, wolvogs and rakunks and the fact that the midday sun can burn the skin from your back. The geological world has changed but the human world certainly hasn't. If anything, it's got worse. Technologies such as the Internet, GM food and genetic engineering are taken to their logical and depressing conclusions. Anyone familiar with 'Transmetropolitan' won't be surprised by the themes explored.

In terms of 'lone survivor in a hostile environment' genre, 'Oryx & Crake' shares similarities with 'I Am Legend' - Snowman (short for Abominable Snowman), sees himself as a creature of myth; the last human left alive. But unlike Matheson's book, the explicit reasons for the final catastrophe are revealed in a horrifying climax, the causes of which are slowly hinted at as the story unfolds through Snowman's memories.

Atwood's skill lies in taking what is merely theory now and having it treated as commonplace by her characters. The horror of the book lies in the fact that it could happen. In some instances events have already overtaken fiction and the seeds of our (possible), destruction have already been sown.

Not a preachy, or po-faced book by any means (there's a surprising amount of humour) but certainly one that makes you stop and think, with characters and events that will haunt you long after the final page. Thoroughly recommended.