Satin Island
by Tom McCarthy
2015 / 208 pages
rating 8 / contemp fiction

Tom McCarthy has done it again.  His last novel was a hum-dinger of experimental fiction focusing on war and the letter “C”  in fact,  that was the title,  “C”.  I think McCarthy’s first novel,  Remainder,  was his best so far.

This time the protagonist’s name is “U” – he is a “corporate anthropologist”  working on a Great Report – an ultimate report on our society.  (This reminded me of Pattern Recognition by William Gibson.)  He gets stuck in an airport and watches signs and people and everything but is struck by what we call “information overload,”  the data is everywhere and he is unable to isolate what he wants.  >>>>MORE>>>>