A monumental, genre-defying novel that David Mitchell calls “Michel Faber’s second masterpiece,” The Book of Strange New Things is a masterwork from a writer in full command of his many talents. It begins with Peter, a devoted man of faith, as he is called to the mission of a lifetime, one that takes him galaxies away from his wife, Bea. Peter becomes immersed in the mysteries of an astonishing … mysteries of an astonishing new environment, overseen by an enigmatic corporation known only as USIC. His work introduces him to a seemingly friendly native population struggling with a dangerous illness and hungry for Peter’s teachings—his Bible is their “book of strange new things.” But Peter is rattled when Bea’s letters from home become increasingly desperate: typhoons and earthquakes are devastating whole countries, and governments are crumbling. Bea’s faith, once the guiding light of their lives, begins to falter.
Suddenly, a separation measured by an otherworldly distance, and defined both by one newly discovered world and another in a state of collapse, is threatened by an ever-widening gulf that is much less quantifiable. While Peter is reconciling the needs of his congregation with the desires of his strange employer, Bea is struggling for survival. Their trials lay bare a profound meditation on faith, love tested beyond endurance, and our responsibility to those closest to us.
Marked by the same bravura storytelling and precise language that made The Crimson Petal and the White such an international success, The Book of Strange New Things is extraordinary, mesmerizing, and replete with emotional complexity and genuine pathos.
From the Hardcover edition.
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Oddly enough, this was the second religious-man-proselytizes-to-alien-race novel I’ve read over the past few months – I picked up The Sparrow in 2017. I dove in hoping for something as weird, unsettling, and philosophical as The Sparrow was… and I was definitely not left wanting.
This book is strange concoction of religious zealotry, apocalypse, marital issues, and a haunting alien planet – as told from the perspective of a sweet and optimistic man. “The Book of Strange New Things” is certainly an apt title.
What a strange and often beautiful book. It is sad and pensive and deeply affecting. I don’t quite know how to describe it, but I had vague feelings of reading a higher brow version of the movie Arrival, though perhaps without the big climatic moment everything seemed to be building towards but never quite reached. Still, you don’t read this book for the plot – you read it for the experience, the elegant linguistics and careful philosophy, and mostly for the slow, creeping thoughts that seep in as you consider the meaning of humanity on a place as inhuman as can ever be imagined.
Calling The Book of Strange New Things science fiction is like calling Pride and Prejudice a romance novel. Yes, it’s about a missionary who’s doing God’s work in some galaxy far, far away, with funding from some murky corporation, while the world is going to hell. But what got to me wasn’t how other-worldly all this strange stuff was. Rather, it struck me as frighteningly familiar. The waves of refugees were just starting to come out of Asia and Africa as I was reading Faber’s book, and I couldn’t help but think: “We’re living in the middle of this thing he’s talking about.” I’m not going to say what I mean by “this thing.” You’ll have to read the book to see.
Can a marriage be saved even if you are doing God’s will and serving him to the best of your ability?
That is the main question I took from reading The Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber. It’s an interesting question that the novel tries to answer. I’m glad this was my choice for the first read and review of the new year. After reading this novel, I can already write that it will be one of the novels I will reflect on and think about often in 2015.
The Book of Strange New Things centers on Peter Leigh, an evangelical pastor from England and his wife, Beatrice whom he calls Bea. Peter has been recruited by USIC, a NASA-like organization, to join a space colony where his primary mission is to be a minister to the Oasans, an alien race that lives on the same colony.
Beatrice is left behind in England and Peter vows to stay in contact with her throughout his entire time on the space colony. He is able read and write letters electronically with his wife and those letters are the heart of the novel. Those letters go from excitement to despair throughout the book and brought the aforementioned question at the beginning of the review to mind.
Can doing God’s work create division in a marriage and even tear it apart? I will be pondering that question for the rest of 2015 and years to come. The Book of Strange New Things shows the power of fiction being able to raise the important questions without being preachy or coming to a one-size-fits all conclusion. This novel while having a science-fiction exterior actually has an interior of faith, love, and marriage.
I highly recommend this thought-provoking, spiritual, and metaphysical novel and believe it should be the choice of book clubs for years to come.
This was an unexpectedly believable future world novel. Vert lovely and quite sweet.
In brief, I wanted to slap the protagonist most of the time and both he and the author are entirely too much in love with their own rambling, repetitive words and phrases.
A Strange New Novel
Having read The Crimson Petal and The White and enjoyed it immensely, I was excited to find another novel by the same author. The subject matter and settings for these two novels couldn’t be further apart, but the lovely and lyrical writing is present in both. I’d highly recommend The Book of Strange New Things. It’s not a simplistic or easy novel, but it is compelling and you will find it engrossing.
An interesting approach to Christian faith, blended with an “end times” reality as it plays out on Earth … and how one man is sent to a far distant planet to minister to the “natives” while he is forced to deal with his own faith and the pressures of marriage while on the mission field.
My favorite book this year. Thoughtful study of the vunerability of marriage to the pressures of individual longing to accomplish big things. Loneliness, self-reliance, love, imagination, and dedication…all explored, in surprising ways.