The Affirmation (1981)
Christopher Priest
With a new introduction by the Author
Book Description
Peter Sinclair, a 29-year-old Londoner, is reeling after losing his father, his girlfriend, his job and his flat. Taking refuge in a friend’s rural cottage, he tries to make sense of things and figure out where his life began to go wrong by writing an autobiography. But it is possible that none of this is true . . .
Peter Sinclair is a 31-year-old native of the city of Jethra in Faiandland who has just won the grand prize in a lottery: a trip to the Dream Archipelago, a neverending series of idyllic islands, where he will undergo a medical procedure that gives him immortality. Because the process also results in total amnesia, Peter must first set down all the details of his life in a manuscript in order to recover the memories afterwards. But it is also possible that none of this is true . . .
As the two narratives intersect and intertwine, the reader must decide what is real and what is not in this brilliant literary mindgame from Christopher Priest, the award-winning author of The Prestige and The Separation.
Christopher Priest
With a new introduction by the Author
Book Description
Peter Sinclair, a 29-year-old Londoner, is reeling after losing his father, his girlfriend, his job and his flat. Taking refuge in a friend’s rural cottage, he tries to make sense of things and figure out where his life began to go wrong by writing an autobiography. But it is possible that none of this is true . . .
Peter Sinclair is a 31-year-old native of the city of Jethra in Faiandland who has just won the grand prize in a lottery: a trip to the Dream Archipelago, a neverending series of idyllic islands, where he will undergo a medical procedure that gives him immortality. Because the process also results in total amnesia, Peter must first set down all the details of his life in a manuscript in order to recover the memories afterwards. But it is also possible that none of this is true . . .
As the two narratives intersect and intertwine, the reader must decide what is real and what is not in this brilliant literary mindgame from Christopher Priest, the award-winning author of The Prestige and The Separation.
reviews
“Priest writes extraordinarily well . . . his best novel to date . . . an atmosphere of increasingly oppressive menace.” – Francis King, The Spectator
“There is a compulsive, dreamlike quality about The Affirmation that defies definition.” – Daily Telegraph
“An original and haunting novel.” – London Times
“A brilliant and sustained novel of imaginative power.” – Vector
“There is a compulsive, dreamlike quality about The Affirmation that defies definition.” – Daily Telegraph
“An original and haunting novel.” – London Times
“A brilliant and sustained novel of imaginative power.” – Vector
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BOOK DETAILS
ISBN: 1954321473 ISBN-13: 978-1954321472 $29.99 US, 230 pp. Case Laminate Hardcover Published 2015 BOOK DETAILS
ISBN: 194114747X ISBN-13: 978-1941147474 $17.99 US, 230 pp. Trade paper Published 2015 |
Due to copyright restrictions, this title is only available to U.S. customers.
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AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Christopher Priest was born in Cheshire, England in 1943. He began writing soon after leaving school and has been a full-time freelance writer since 1968. He has published thirteen novels, four short story collections and a number of other books, including critical works, biographies, novelizations, and children’s nonfiction.
Priest first gained notice with short stories contributed to science fiction magazines such as Impulse and New Worlds in the 1960s and later won widespread acclaim for his novels, including Inverted World (1974), The Affirmation (1981), and The Glamour (1984). The success of these novels, which have gone on to be recognized as classics of the genre, led Granta to name Priest one of the top young British novelists in its 1983 list. More recently, The Prestige (1995) won both the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for best novel of the year and the World Fantasy Award and was adapted for a major Hollywood film directed by Christopher Nolan, and The Separation (2002) won both the Arthur C. Clarke and BSFA Awards. Priest’s work has also earned major awards internationally, including the Kurd Laßwitz Award (Germany), the Eurocon Award (Yugoslavia), the Ditmar Award (Australia), and Le Grand Prix de L’Imaginaire (France). In 2001 he was awarded the Prix Utopia (France) for lifetime achievement.
In addition to writing books, Priest has written drama for radio and television, and as a journalist he has written features and reviews for The Times, the Guardian, the Independent, the New Statesman, the Scotsman, and many different magazines.
His most recent novel, The Adjacent, was published in the U.S. in April 2014.
Priest first gained notice with short stories contributed to science fiction magazines such as Impulse and New Worlds in the 1960s and later won widespread acclaim for his novels, including Inverted World (1974), The Affirmation (1981), and The Glamour (1984). The success of these novels, which have gone on to be recognized as classics of the genre, led Granta to name Priest one of the top young British novelists in its 1983 list. More recently, The Prestige (1995) won both the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for best novel of the year and the World Fantasy Award and was adapted for a major Hollywood film directed by Christopher Nolan, and The Separation (2002) won both the Arthur C. Clarke and BSFA Awards. Priest’s work has also earned major awards internationally, including the Kurd Laßwitz Award (Germany), the Eurocon Award (Yugoslavia), the Ditmar Award (Australia), and Le Grand Prix de L’Imaginaire (France). In 2001 he was awarded the Prix Utopia (France) for lifetime achievement.
In addition to writing books, Priest has written drama for radio and television, and as a journalist he has written features and reviews for The Times, the Guardian, the Independent, the New Statesman, the Scotsman, and many different magazines.
His most recent novel, The Adjacent, was published in the U.S. in April 2014.