A Scientific Romance by Ronald Wright

My bookclub was reading this for January so I reread it. I was impressed all over again. I read this long ago when I first came out, and loved it. I found the idea of finding H.G. Wells's time machine and going to the future to find the cure for mad cow disease, then going to the past to cure his lost love a timely plot device. And I loved Wright's sense of humour. He must have been the first to write a novel about global warming. The Thames is filled with mangroves and crocodiles, no humans are present in London, and the main character, an archaeologist, uses his professional skills as he tries to figure out what happened to cause the total breakdown of society. Then he sets off north in search of other humans, and finds them. There is one caveat--many in my book club found this novel hard going. It is filled with allusions to history, philosophy and literature. I consider myself a generalist--I know a little about a lot of stuff--so loved the eclectic references. But for many this may make the novel a bit too erudite. I liked this much better than Atwood's Oryx and Crake (and I am an Atwood fan, see the next review!) I fully intend to find and read other Ronald Wright books, both fiction and non-fiction. If my warning hasn't put you off, pick up this creative response to Wells's classic.