So I got the best ever compliment on Zoo City today.
RT @mareinna: I work with immigrants & refugees. Zoo City was recommended to me by one of our African clients. He said it reminded him of home.
I can’t tell you how much that means, to have twanged a chord with someone who has lived through the reality.
There have been some other lovely reviews of Zoo City recently:
Battered, Tattered, Yellowed & Creased: Adventures in Vintage Genre Fiction said: “Beukes nails the neo-noir thriller, playing in the bleakest of dark settings and amping it up through the use of the animals and magic; Zinzi descends into the foulest of Johannesburg’s locales—not just the sewers—over the course of her investigation. The writing ranges from immaculate to jaw-dropping, and matches the spectacular pacing well.”
The Guilded Earlobe gave the audiobook, narrated by Justine Eyre, a B+. “Zoo City is a unique novel, coupling vivid fantasy concepts with a gritty urban setting and offering one of the most interesting main characters I have experienced in a while.”
Moxyland got some love too.
Over at 52Challenges2013, Simon wrote (in his first ever review): “There is a palpable sense of fear and awe for technology that pervades the novel… The book itself takes and leaves no prisoners. If you are expecting happy endings and epoch-shaping revolutions then you will come away disappointed. Because, after all, real life is not often like that. And this is exactly what Moxyland feels like: a very possible reality… the perfect balance of futuristic development, witty dialogue, engaging character and gripping storyline to make me want a lot more.”