Flood, The (2004 Longlisted For Orange Prize For Fiction)

Description:
President Bliss is handling a tricky situation with customary brio, but after months of ceaseless rain the city is sinking under the floods. The rich are safe on high ground, but the poor are getting damper in their packed tower blocks, and the fanatical 'Last Days' sect is recruiting thousands ...When at last the sun breaks through the clouds Lottie heads off to the opera, husband Harold listens to jazz and their ditsy teenage daughter Lola fights capitalism by bunking off school. Shirley takes her twin boys to the zoo. The Government - eager to detract attention from a foreign war it has waged - announces a spectacular City Gala. But not even TV astrologer Davey Lucas can predict the extraordinary climax that ensues.

Review:
'Gripping, original and highly entertaining - Maggie Gee at her superb best.' J G Ballard 'Dazzling ... alternately lyrical and austere ... unbearably touching.' The Observer 'Eloquent, angry and beautiful ... her best book yet.' Hilary Mantel 'The Flood is Gee's most apocalyptic vision to date ... an incredible feat of sustained imaginative continuity.' The Guardian 'A Must-Read Book for 2004.' Daily Mail ' ... an addition to an eccentric but valuable tradition of English fiction ... in which the visionary and the mundane mingle, producing effects by turn comical and grand.' Sunday Times 'Gee's ability to ask big 'what if?' questions while never losing sight of the humdrum details of life ... gives her un-brave new world credibility.' The Independent '...exhuberant ... I thoroughly enjoyed it.' Sunday Telegraph 'The Flood, for all its passion and intricacy, is also a very funny book ... rewarding ... carefully written, using language echoing the water that ebbs and flows, and eventually floods the pages.' TLS ' ...a rare writer who is willing to address issues topical to contemporary Britain' Daily Telegraph 'A playful apocalypse.' The Bookseller ' ... a surprising melange of fantasy, realism, and very dry humour' Big Issue ' ... startling, insidious imagery' Metro 'Gee's admirably dyspeptic and frequently funny novel is a wake-up call to us all' Mail on Sunday

Author Biography:
Maggie Gee was chosen as one of Granta's 'Best Young British Novelists' in 1983. Since then she has published eight novels to great acclaim, including Grace, The Ice People and Light Years. Her last novel, The White Family (Saqi), was short-listed for the 2002 Orange Prize for Fiction and for the International Impac Dublin Literary Award 2004. She is the first female Chair of the Royal Society of Literature and lives in London.