A thriller of war that never was--of survival in an impossible
city--of surreal cataclysm. In The Last Days of New Paris, China
Miéville entwines true historical events and people with his daring,
uniquely imaginative brand of fiction, reconfiguring history and art
into something new.
"Beauty will be convulsive. . . ."
1941. In the chaos of wartime Marseille, American engineer--and occult
disciple--Jack Parsons stumbles onto a clandestine anti-Nazi group,
including Surrealist theorist André Breton. In the strange games of the
dissident diplomats, exiled revolutionaries, and avant-garde artists,
Parsons finds and channels hope. But what he unwittingly unleashes is
the power of dreams and nightmares, changing the war and the world
forever.
1950. A lone Surrealist fighter, Thibaut, walks a new, hallucinogenic
Paris, where Nazis and the Resistance are trapped in unending conflict,
and the streets are stalked by living images and texts--and by the
forces of Hell. To escape the city, he must join forces with Sam, an
American photographer intent on recording the ruins, and make common
cause with a powerful, enigmatic figure of chance and rebellion: the
exquisite corpse.
But Sam is being hunted. And new secrets will emerge that will test all
their loyalties--to each other, to Paris old and new, and to reality
itself.
Praise for The Last Days of New Paris
"Beautiful, stunningly realized . . . [The Last Days of New Paris]
is a brief vacation in alien latitudes, a midnight layover in an
imaginary place."--NPR
"A thoughtful, highbrow novella . . . Miéville's self-assured style
offers up a strong sense of humanity, while the strange Surrealist
monsters give Last Days a fun and complementary mad-science
component."--USA Today
"[A] testament to the necessary, progressive power of art . . . Both
moving and disturbingly timely."--Newsday
"A novel both unhinged and utterly compelling, a kind of guerrilla
warfare waged by art itself, combining both meticulous historical
research and Miéville's unparalleled inventiveness."--Chicago
Tribune
"An extraordinarily original work that foregrounds Mieville's
considerable ingenuity and innovation."--The Millions
"Hauntingly poetic, strangely beautiful, and erratically
intense."--San Francisco Book Review
"Dazzling . . . quite a feat."--The Guardian
