- J. G. Ballard, Introduction by Ali Smith

Super-Cannes

By J. G. Ballard, Introduction by Ali Smith

A high-tech business park on the Mediterranean is the setting for a most disturbing crime in this reissue featuring an introduction by Ali Smith.

People are so immersed in their work they wouldn’t notice the end of the world.

A high-tech business park lies hidden in the hills above Cannes – an ultra-modern utopia where residents live a life of luxury and seclusion.

But when Jane Sinclair arrives in Eden-Olympia for a new medical post, a disturbing mystery awaits. What caused her apparently sane predecessor to murder ten people in a shooting spree that made headlines around the world? As her husband Paul explores his new surroundings, he begins to uncover a thriving subculture of crime that is spiralling out of control.

Both novel of ideas and complex thriller, Super-Cannes is an extraordinary satire from the author of ‘Empire of the Sun’, ‘The Drowned World’ and ‘Crash’.

Author: J. G. Ballard
Format: Paperback
Release Date: 09 May 2024
Pages: 416
ISBN: 978-0-00-655160-7
J. G. Ballard was born in 1930 in Shanghai. After internment in a civilian prison camp, his family returned to England in 1946. His 1984 bestseller ‘Empire of the Sun’ won the Guardian Fiction Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. His controversial novel ‘Crash’ was made into a film by David Cronenberg. His autobiography ‘Miracles of Life’ was published in 2008, and a collection of interviews with the author, ‘Extreme Metaphors’, was published in 2012. J. G. Ballard passed away in 2009.

”'Sublime…An elegant, elaborate trap of a novel, which reads as a companion piece to 'Cocaine Nights' but takes ideas from that novel and runs further. The first essential novel of the 21st century” - Independent

”'Possibly his greatest book. 'Super-Cannes' is both a novel of ideas and a compelling thriller that will keep you turning the pages to the shocking denouement. Only Ballard could have produced it” - Sunday Express

”'In this tautly paced thriller he brilliantly details how man’s darker side derails a vast experiment in living, and shows the dangers of a near-future in which going mad is the only way of staying sane” - Daily Mail

”'Vintage Ballard, a gripping blend of stylised thriller and fantastic imaginings” - Guardian