Number 32- Make Room! Make Room!- Harry Harrison

 

When this was chosen for a book group, I was very excited. I'd not read a Harry Harrison since a few of the Stainless Steel Rat books several decades ago.  Plus, when I looked for it on google, I discovered that this was the basis for the film Soylent Green.

As a result, I went into this book expecting a light hearted science fiction adventure with a dark twist in the tail.

That is not what you get from this book in the slightest. This is a grim dystopian novel set in a massively overcrowded future version of New York.  The far distant future in question here being 1999.

Andy Rush is a New York detective. When he's asked to solve the murder of a local criminal with high up connections, he finds himself caught in a whole heap of trouble- although he does has the benefit of a fresh love life in the shape of the victim's ex-mistress.

The world building in this book is brilliant.  It all feels so grimy and horrible that you find yourself wanting to take a shower after some sequences. 

The story seems to take second place to the world-building as there's not really that much happening in relation to the case. In a city this crowded, with 50s style technology that isn't up to even supplying water to the whole population, detective work won't go far. 

In alternating chapters we follow Andy and the killer as they live their lives over several months leading to the dawn of the new century. It's not a cat and mouse situation, literally just their lives in different parts of the city. That's not to say it's not interesting.  The writing is top notch. The world Harrison creates is a character in its own right and the novel is never even close to boring.

As predictive dystopias go, it missed the mark by a huge distance, thank goodness.  It failed to take into account that technology would improve. This is a nightmare vision of a world that could have been. It doesn't have the famous twist from the film, and I think I only recall one or two events from the book being used in the film although it's been a long long time). 

If there are any flaws, I would say that the repeated lectures from Andy's flatmate about reproductive control near the end of the book seem to come from nowhere, and the second time he rants on the subject could almost be a cut and paste from his rant 5 pages or so earlier as it covered all the same points again, just with the character talking to someone else. 

Despite being entirely different to what I expected- a bleak dystopian warning about overpopulation- rather than a light and fluffy adventure with a twist- I still really enjoyed this. And just check out that gorgeous cover art. They don't make them like that any more.