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by J. G. Ballard
The explosive J.G. Ballard renaissance, which began with the 2009 publication of The Complete Stories of J.G. Ballard, continues with the appearance of Millennium People, Ballard's first new novel to be published in America in nearly a decade. No writer, certainly no fiction writer, has examined in recent times the profound social malaise of the middle classes as presciently as Ballard, whose penultimate novel, Millennium People, a brilliant political satire, is filled with stunning psychological insights, twisted humor, and unrelenting suspense.
When a bomb goes off at Heathrow Airport it looks like another random act of violence to psychologist David Markham. But then he discovers that his ex-wife Laura is among the victims. Following a police lead that suggests the explosion was not the work of a foreign terrorist, but instead a shadowy and ruthless group based in the comfortable Thameside estate of Chelsea Marina, Markham begins to infiltrate London's fringe protest movement.
Led by Richard Gould, a charismatic pediatrician turned cult leader, the clandestine group aims to rouse London's squeezed middle classes to anger and violence, to free them from both the self-imposed burdens of civic responsibility and the trappings of a consumer society: private schools, foreign nannies, health insurance, and overpriced housing. But when Markham becomes enamored with an exotic film studies professor who moonlights as a terrorist cell leader, he too gets caught up in the idealistic campaign spiraling rapidly out of control. At last succumbing to the irresistible charms of Gould, the group's leader, Markham abandons his original investigation to give his unyielding support to the uprising, becoming an active participant in the process.
As widespread rioting erupts and England's capital city becomes a crucible of existential rage, a frenzied English populous begins destroying the very symbols that define their middle-class status, setting fire to Volvos, destroying travel agencies, and smoke-bombing department stores. In an unnerving and prophetic ending that is so jarring it will resonate well beyond the confines of fiction, Millennium People becomes more than a novel; it becomes a shockingly plausible, deeply unsettling vision of society in collapse, one that, in the words of John Gray in the New Statesman, "dissects the perverse psychology that links terrorists with their innocent victims."
"Starred Review. Ballard is a British Philip K. Dick, heir to Conrad and H.G. Wells, in whose stories the present, taken to extremes, anticipates the future. In fact, the only complaint to be made of this bruisingly smart novel is that it has taken eight years for it to appear in the U.S." - Publishers Weekly
"Starred Review. Vintage Ballard, smartly observed and tartly written.
Let’s hope there’s more in the vault." - Kirkus Review
"Starred Review. Important Briticisms may be lost on American readers, but no library should pass on this last quirky take on the problems of the new century from one of the great virtuosos of 20th-century fiction." - Library Journal
"Ballard, acutely fierce as ever, detonates a bomb under Middle England in his continuing attempt to shock the middle classes out of complacency and into violent struggle. " - Esquire (UK)
"Much of the fun of Millennium People - and it is one of the most amusing novels I've read in a long time - comes from watching as the world finally catches up with Ballard and Ballard, wryly, reacts." - The Guardian (UK)
"Ballard's flowing prose exerts its usual hypnotic spell and there are many darkly beautiful moments." - Daily Express (UK)
"Wonderfully warped, blackly comic! written with Ballard's customary panache, its potent mix of sex, violence and radicalism will keep his fans happy. Millennium People is at once deadly serious and slightly ridiculous - and somehow all the more unsettling for it." - The Economist (UK)
"Millennium People will compete with the best of contemporary British fiction." - The Independent (UK)
"Terrifying and strangely haunting... A riveting work from a writer of rare imaginative largesse, a bearer of bad tidings, unforgettably told." - Daily Telegraph (UK)
This information about Millennium People was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Born in Shanghai in 1930, J. G. Ballard is the author of sixteen novels, including Empire of the Sun, The Drowned World, Crash, and Millennium People. He died in London in April 2009.
Pony Confidential
by Christina Lynch
In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.
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