This is the debut novel by the author of ‘Nevada Noir’, the trilogy of short stories I reviewed for Roseland online some time ago.

Split into three parts: Convergence, Chaos and Divergence, the story begins on page 5. By the end of page 7 I was already hooked. To quote from my message to the author “I don’t know what to say except I thought it was just stunning!”

Although written during the ‘Coronavirus years’, this is not about Covid itself or even about how it impacted us in real life. It is, instead, a work of fiction predicting the sort of societal collapse which might occur in a post pandemic world.

It’s a frighteningly realistic story of love and loss and of living in a decaying world, one in which survival of the fittest is replaced by survival of those prepared to do what they never imagined and act in a way they never thought themselves capable of.

Once I’d started the book I wanted to carry on reading but instead I had to keep stopping to absorb the descriptions of the inevitable descent of normal day to day life into hell; the result of what happens when life changes overnight, and extreme fear and distress take over.

Could I, would I, do what was necessary to survive? Would you? I suspect none of us knows how easy it would be to abandon civilised behaviour and how quickly any of us would ignore the established rules of society, replacing them with the need to destroy or be destroyed.

At the end, the author writes that he’s got “a tonne of other stories bubbling away” including ideas for a sequel. He asks readers who enjoyed it to let him know so he can start on the story of what happens next. Meanwhile, someone should snap up the film rights.

Frightening in its intensity, hypnotic in its tension and worryingly plausible, this is truly outstanding writing.