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Published Feb 2023
368 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
From the brilliant, bestselling author of Child 44 comes a suspenseful and fast-paced novel about an Antarctic colony of global apocalypse survivors seeking to reinvent civilization under the most extreme conditions imaginable.
The world has fallen. Without warning, a mysterious and omnipotent force has claimed the planet for their own. There are no negotiations, no demands, no reasons given for their actions. All they have is a message: humanity has thirty days to reach the one place on Earth where they will be allowed to exist…Antarctica.
Cold People follows the perilous journeys of a handful of those who endure the frantic exodus to the most extreme environment on the planet. But their goal is not merely to survive the present. Because as they cling to life on the ice, the remnants of their past swept away, they must also confront the urgent challenge: can they change and evolve rapidly enough to ensure humanity's future? Can they build a new society in the sub-zero cold?
Original and imaginative, as profoundly intimate as it is grand in scope, Cold People is a masterful and unforgettable epic.
"What lines, if any, shouldn't be crossed to save humanity from extinction? That question is at the heart of this stunning postapocalyptic thriller.... Smith, the author of brilliant historical and psychological suspense novels, shows his range is even broader in this triumph of imagination and empathy." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"A brilliantly conceived postapocalyptic story that tackles a well-worn subject (a desperate race to save humanity) from a new and absolutely captivating angle. Smith's near-future world is wonderfully imaginative and rigorously detailed, the kind of made-up place that feels viscerally real. A real treat." - Booklist (starred review)
"A speculative masterpiece that will resonate with fans of Emily St. John Mandel, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Jeff VanderMeer." - Library Journal (starred review)
"Part Frankenstein and part Nineteen Eighty-Four, the latest novel by the author of Child 44 is nothing if not ambitious. But after getting off to a great start, in which a family overcomes grievous odds to make it to Antarctica by supertanker only to get caught in an offshore logjam and risk missing the aliens' deadline, the novel loses its heart and narrative sweep to stiffly written scenes and didactic commentaries." - Kirkus Reviews
"Phenomenally imagined, intricately woven, and masterfully brought to life. It's so descriptive that rarely have I read a book where I've felt I am living side by side with the characters. As a writer, Smith really is one of a kind." - John Marrs, author of The One
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: James Hopkirk
Tom Rob Smith was born in 1979 to a Swedish mother and English father, both antique dealers, and brought up in South London, where he now lives. He started writing plays at school and continued at St. John's, Cambridge. After graduating from Cambridge University in 2001, he completed his studies in Italy, studying creative writing for a year. He also worked as a scriptwriter.
His first novel, Child 44, about a series of child murders in Stalinist Russia, appeared in early 2008. It was awarded the 2008 Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for Best Thriller of the year by the Crime Writer's Association. It was recently a Barnes & Noble recommended book. On July 29, 2008 the book was named on the long list for the 2008 Man Booker Prize. In November 2008, he was nominated for the 2008 Costa First Novel ...
... Full Biography
Author Interview
Link to Tom Rob Smith's Website
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