The social commentary here, aimed right back at late-1960s and early-1970s Britain, is unabrasive but it is also unrelenting, proving that speculative fiction can speak to social and cultural issues "on the ground," as it were. What I really found interesting here was how Priest handles gender and class in this seemingly organized world of the city. But, just as it is laborious for Helward, so, too, must it be for the reader this is the crux of the "inverted world" and having this background allows what happens to make sense. I did almost give up halfway through Part 1, and I assume many readers might find the detailed pages-and pages and pages-of track-laying laborious. What a wonderfully executed book! The structure of the book, its pace, how it negotiates between first-person, third-person, and a more distanced narrator in one section, are all handled superbly and lend a cadence to the episodes in the novel as well.
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