The Raw Shark Texts
April 5th 2007 11:20
'The Raw Shark Texts' is the debut novel from Stephen Hall, and is getting huge tractor-loads of hype from all over the place. The Australian-release of the book itself is covered in a litany of overflowingly positive reviews... Nicole Kidman allegedly wanted the author to change the protagonist from male to female so she could star in a film adaptation, and Mark Haddon (the celebrated author of 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time') called it "The bastard love child of 'The Matrix', 'Jaws' and the 'Da Vinci Code'". And it doesn't end there.
Prior to writing the book, Hall had written various short pieces and a play or two, and he managed to attract a great deal of interest early on with this novel. It has been sold to nearly 30 international publishers and a film is currently being developed by British film company, Film Four. I guess you could say it's a pretty exciting debut for a writer.
I was just looking around in the bookshop when I spotted the spine of this book and all the praise scrawled all over it. The cover itself (different to the one pictured above) was an intriguing slab of text altered and swirled to look like it had been cut up for a shark's fin. It was so eye-catching and quirky, I had to find out more.
The actual premise of the book is out there too, it concerns our protagonist waking from a long bout of unconsciousness to find a message addressed to himself from the 'first' version of himself. Apparently he is being pursued by some kind of metaphorical or metaphysical shark that devours his memory, and it's a race against time for the protagonist to find out who he is and what exactly is happening.
Anyway, here's a write up from the Angus and Robertson website...
I was unconscious. I'd stopped breathing. I don't know how long it lasted, but the engines and drivers that keep the human machine functioning at a mechanical level must have trip-switched, responding to the stillness with a general systems panic. Autopilot failure--switch to emergency manual override. This is how my life started, my second life.
So begins The Raw Shark Texts, the startlingly original debut novel from Steven Hall that is already electrifying booksellers and publishers all over the world. Eric Sanderson wakes up one day with no idea who or where he is. A note instructs him to call a Dr. Randle, who informs him that he is undergoing yet another episode of memory loss and that for the last two years--since the tragic death of his great love, Clio, while vacationing in Greece--he's been suffering from an acute disassociative disorder. But there may be more to the story, or it may be a different story altogether.
As Eric Sanderson begins to examine letters and papers left behind by "the first Eric Sanderson" and the staggering tale they seem to contain, he and the reader embark on a quest to recover the truth and to escape the predatory forces that threaten to devour him. Moving with the pace and momentum of a superb thriller, exploring ideas about language and information as well as identity, The Raw Shark Texts is a brilliant novel about the magnitude of love and the devastating effect of losing that love. It will dazzle you, it will move you, and it will leave an indelible imprint like nothing you have read in a long time.
I think it sounds pretty cool. I might have to check it out!
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