Russell Hoban - Riddley Walker

[Libby]

This is an amazing book. I groaned when I first opened it because it's written in a kind of degraded English, but it's fairly easy to get most of it - easy enough not to spoil the reading and, in fact, I found that guessing some of the more difficult words and phrases was part of the fun. It's set in Britain post- (some kind of) nuclear apocalypse and it's the story of a teenage boy who's old enought ot be treated as an adult - life expectancy is short in this world and children grow up first.

 

It sounds grim, I know, and parts of it are - but I actually found it tremendously cheering and uplifting. One of the puzzles is that what Riddley's contemporaries tell him about history as they know and understand may not be entirely accurate - yet the book avoids being irritatingly post-modernist.

 

Available in various editions: incl. Bloomsbury 2002 and Picador 1982 (both paperbacks). And yes, it's by the same guy who wrote 'The Mouse and his Child' (which I haven't read) and the 'Frances the Badger' series (one of which I have read, and enjoyed) but, obviously, this is very different.

 

Anyone else enjoyed this book - or know other adult works by Hoban? I want recommendations for what I should read next.