Book Review: Un Lon Dun

I just finished reading "Un Lon Dun" by China Mieville. China has won several awards for his adult science-fiction-fantasy works. But I'd never heard of him until My Krodie took me to his book reading a few weeks back. I picked up this, his latest, and one of his older books that sounded interesting. I've read a few chapters in the other one and all of this one. China's usual work is much tougher to read. It's adult fiction and you should be prepared to work a bit for his usual stuff. However, this being designed for young adults he wrote accordingly. This book is on par with one of the later Harry Potter books for reading level and subject matter. It's a darker Alice in Wonderland. My Krodie's daughter got scared at the reading.

China Miéville speaking at Politics and Prose. My Krodie photographer.

It starts like your typical fantasy book. The magical fairy tale land is in danger and only the chosen one can save it. However, our heroes get sent back home early in the story and the chosen one loses all memory of the magical fairy tale land. Her friend, however, finds out something that the people in UnLondon need to know and has to go back. The prophecy is wrong and they still have to stop the threat, but now they're completely off script.

Great book.

p.s. I feel I should mention that the book includes a lot of sketches done by the author that help you picture what some of the strange creatures and objects look like. I'm stealing this for my book.