Prophet

"Prophet is the first one on my list because I just think it’s so extraordinary. I’d never heard anything like it before! It opens with the most wonderful scene: an American diner has appeared in a field in the south of England overnight, for no apparent reason. Two people who are involved with the CIA are brought over from a nearby American airbase in order to investigate what this might be; they think it might be something to do with the airbase, but they’ve honestly got no idea. And when they come close to the diner, they realise that it’s not a real diner – it looks like one but there’s stuff in it that doesn’t work, everything looks a little bit wrong. After this instance, other things start appearing all over the place: objects, places, even animals. And it’s really intriguing. But what’s really wonderful about it are the two main characters. One of them is a very austere ex-soldier type, who uses words like ‘sub-optimal’. The other one has what he cheerfully describes as a ‘terrorist beard’, and gets into fights for fun, and is on an amazing rainbow of drugs. He just has a ridiculous time in life – but he has a gift, which is to understand when he’s being told the truth, and to understand when he’s being told a lie. It’s like something goes clunk in his head, and he knows that’s the truth. They have to work together, and they’ve got this very interesting history. And of course they’re falling in love, and it’s just beautifully romantic. It’s really very, very different from anything else I’ve seen, so it had to go on the list. Yeah, it’s definitely a big blend! The best books are though, right? I think it’s what happens to genres. If you look at genres that are quite old – take Gothic , which has been around for nearly 200 years – the way it started out and the way it is now are really different. But there is still this recognisable Gothicy-ness to it. Science fiction isn’t a lot newer than the Gothic – we start seeing it just after – but I think we’re just seeing those natural fluxes and permutations that keep genres alive. If they stay static, they die. I really like enemies to lovers . Of course, it’s a massive trope – but it’s a trope because it really works a lot of the time. When we talk about tropes, it’s really important to draw a line between archetype and stereotype; and I think enemies to lovers is actually an archetypal trope, rather than a stereotypical trope, because it has infinite variety. You can apply it to different things again and again, and it will be recognisable – which is often quite important in a story – but it will feel fresh at the same time. They’re the only people who understand each other. They’re both very strange people, particularly the man who understands the truth. Obviously, his difficulty is that nobody can lie to him. The difficulty that the other guy has is that he’s almost incapable of lying to anybody ever. This equally sabotages him – it’s a lovely fit."