Dreamland: An Evening Standard 'Best New Book' of 2021

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It took Rosa 7 years to write this novel. I’m guessing a lot of the time was spent polishing the similes, which are laid out aplenty and are very good. It’s the first novel I read where COVID-19 is mentioned – it must have been worked into the plot towards the end, just before the final proofs were signed off. Here are some of the similes I really liked:

The Best Near-Future Dystopias | Five Books Expert

In their new home, they find space and wide skies, a world away from the cramped bedsits they’ve lived in up until now. But challenges swiftly mount. JD’s business partner, Kole, has a violent, charismatic energy that whirlpools around him and threatens to draw in the whole family. And when Chance comes across Franky, a girl her age she has never seen before – well-spoken and wearing sunscreen – something catches in the air between them. Their fates are bound: a connection that is immediate, unshakeable, and, in a time when social divides have never cut sharper, dangerous. The journey begins in Australia, increasingly taking centre stage because it sits below the world’s most economically and militarily powerful dictatorship – China.My only issue with this book was the ending point. Rankin-Gee weaves some beautiful writing into a story that is often harsh and aggressive, and although I can understand the open-ended imagination prompting ending, I am so invested in these characters that it’s a little disappointing to not know a little more. However, I still gave Dreamland 5 stars because the rest of the book deserves it, and I can understand why the ending could be like it was. However, if you’d like to tell me what happens with a certain child, Rosa, please do! Climate change brings scorching summers and rising sea levels; there’s a great “washout” early in the book, a huge tide surging through the town causing devastating floods and drownings, something that becomes a more regular occurrence until townsfolk plan their day’s movements by the high tide times that make the streets impassable. is touted as the deadline for the world to go carbon neutral and preserve natural habitats. How optimistic are you that we’ll make it?

Dreamland by Rosa Rankin-Gee | Goodreads

Yes. There’s a slow decline in your book—economically, and the increasing shrugging off of responsibility by the government. Shall we talk about World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War? I think this introduces us to a different sort of near-future dystopia, something a little more fantastical, although it’s played completely straight. Chance falls in love with Francesca, a wealthy Londoner who is working with one of those aid charities. While Chance dreams of forging a life together, Francesca is evasive. Chance is a vividly drawn character. We see that she has lived a brutal life and that her future holds little promise. We can understand why she wants to be with Francesca, and grab a part of her world, however fleeting. But their on-off relationship may pall with some readers after a while. This combination of circumstances built over time to turn Thanet into somewhere ripe for exploitation by populist dog-whistlers. The region became fertile ground for UKIP to the extent that in 2014 an in-depth analysis of the area’s issues in the London Review of Books was titled “In Farageland”.

If you are an inveterate reader, the odds are good, better than good actually, that fellow readers or close friends (sometimes, happily, they are both) that at some point they will recommend a book to you. A book, they will assure you with a mix of solemnity and enthusiasm, is Continue Reading courtesy IMP Awards) Creative inspiration can come from all kinds of strange, beautiful and unexpected places – a waterfall at sunset, a colourfully-dressed woman on a train at peak hour or a snippet of history, long forgotten but dredged up to fill a social media post with a fascinating factoid. Continue Reading