Despite not posting to the blog for a while, I haven’t been reading as many books as I would have liked to. It’s a good job I enjoy my work! Still, I have found some time to raid the local second hand bookshop (Past Sentence, Faversham). One of the books I picked up was called The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross. Now, if you are mad enough to read here often, you’ll know I enjoyed a couple of other of his books (Glasshouse, Iron Sunrise, Singularity Sky) so seeing one of his books on the shelf made it a must buy. I confess, the title put me off. I read for enjoyment, the word atrocity doesn’t conjure up nice images for me. Still, I bought it, I did at least start it….
.. in fact, it was so addictive I read it within a few days! Very different from the other Charles Stross books (it was set in present day, not far future), this Sci-Fi fiction referenced everyday things in a not so every day occult stroke multi-dimension stroke zombie sort of way, all the time staying within the bounds of a logic that kept it just believable enough…
Is this book right for you? Well, if, like me, when shopping for something to read whilst passing a supermarket you go for “New Scientist” over “What Car“, then yes. You’ll get some of the techy humour that sprinkled through the book.
About 2/3rds through I thought the story was coming to an end when all of a sudden a completely unexpected twist brought a whole new… erm, story. I’ll not tell you what or how or why, that would spoil the fun if you get to read it. If you have read it, allow me to help you reminisce by saying “CCTV” and “concrete cows”.
Despite my initial reservations over the title, this book gets a rootie rating of 5 out of 5