Product Description

Nelson used to be a radical journalist, but now he works for Monad, one of the world's leading corporations. Monad make the Dr Easys, the androids which patrol London's streets: assisting police, easing tensions, calming the populace. But Monad also makes the Red Men - tireless, intelligent, creative and entirely virtual corporate workers - and it's looking to expand the programme. So Nelson is put in charge of Redtown: a virtual city, inhabited by copies of real people going about their daily business, in which new policies, diseases and disasters can be studied in perfect simulation. Nelson finds himself at the helm of a grand project whose goals appear increasingly authoritarian and potentially catastrophic. As the boundaries between Redtown and the real world become ever more brittle, and revolutionary factions begin to align themselves against the Red Men, Nelson finds himself forced to choose sides: Monad or his family, the corporation or the community, the real or the virtual. "The Red Men" is at heart a novel about a character wrestling with his conscience, set against a pervasive and Orwellian vision of contemporary society: surveillance, automation, biotechnology, and their implications for our humanity.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #197503 in Books
• Published on: 2007-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

Review
'Lewes, Sussex, where this column began all those horned moons ago. As I walk from the station under another horned moon I spy, standing outside a cosy looking pub, the cuddly dolmen of Matthew De Abaitua. Thirteen years ago, Matthew - who is now a talented novelist in his own right - spent a six-month sojourn as my live-in amanuensis and secretary. It was a thankless task: so far as I can remember I was completely spark-a-loco. We were living in a tiny cottage in Suffolk, and I was given to harvesting opium from the poppies that grew wild in the field margins, then driving my Citroen deux-chevaux across the same fields, solely by the light of a horned moon, Matthew placidly crammed into the passenger seat." Will Self in the Independent.

About the Author
Born in Liverpool in 1971, De Abaitua studied under Malcolm Bradbury and Rose Tremain at the University of East Anglia and worked as Will Self's amanuensis before joining The Idler magazine as Deputy Editor (he remains Editor at Large) and was also Literary Editor of Esquire magazine. He has contributed to a number of anthologies including the bestselling 'Disco Biscuits' (Sceptre) and 'Retro Retro' (Serpent's Tail), and has reviewed for and contributed widely to The Guardian and The Observer, among others. He wrote and presented an documentary series on British Science Fiction for Channel 4, and is now the Editor of Channel 4's film review site, where he launched the internet-only film review TV show, Movie Rush, which is at the cutting edge of internet media. He also contributed creatively to marketing strategy for Big Brother, The Simpsons, Ali G and other programmes.

Customer Reviews

Recommended.
This is a brilliant read, a first novel full of technology-bewitched ideas and sharp, modern imagery of landscapes, workspaces and despair. There are evocative lines of prose and great one-liners, and the novel is tied together by the exploration of the mind and reality. It's rough around the edges in a way that makes me excited to see this author's talent develop. I had some rare moments of real connection with this work, I feel that it is expressing something important about the modern condition.

Philip K Dick for contemporary Britain
De Abaitua's debut novel is an excellent read. If you like Philip K Dick, or like you literary fiction to have some science fiction elements, or your SF to be more literary, this is a must.

Like Philip K Dick, De Abaitua chronicles that sense of bewilderment with life, bafflement at the changing world, at technology and progress and how your mind struggles to reconcile with it, while you're still gripped, fascinated.

It's gripping, horrifying, pertinent and a fascinating potrait of the modern world (specifically London's Hackney and Canary Wharf, and other parts of Britain), twisted slightly but still recognisable: for how the marketeers manipulate society, how we mortgage our souls to technology, and for how we feel torn between nature and nurture, tradition and innovation.

Trans Genre
'I felt like I was chairing a group therapy session for the four horsemen of the apocalypse'.
We all prefer a certain 'type', whether in music, film or literature, or in most other matters. If the object of our attention belongs to this type we will generally appreciate it, even if the quality is not high. Others, who do not share our taste, will probably not appreciate the poor quality effort that happens to fall into the genre we prefer.
There are films, songs and books that cross this divide. They have a quality about them that makes the experience ejoyable, even for those who would not normally appreciate the genre. There are great rap songs! No really, there are.
This book is one of those works that is of such a high standard that it should be appreciated by any reader. The fiction is based around science (or technology), the novel, therefore, falls into the category of science fiction. The characters are so well drawn, the scenes so well set and the plot unfolds in such a way that this book is accessible to readers of most types of fiction. The author's use of the English language is quite brilliant without being pretentious.
I understand that this is the first novel from this particular writer, I am looking forward to reading his future efforts.