Twenty Trillion Leagues Under the Sea

Description

It is 1958 and France's first nuclear submarine, Plongeur, leaves port for the first of its sea trials. On board, gathered together for the first time, one of the Navy's most experienced captains and a tiny skeleton crew of sailors, engineers and scientists. The Plongeur makes her first dive and goes down, and down and down... Out of control, the submarine plummets to a depth where the pressure will crush her hull, killing everyone on board, and beyond. The pressure builds, the hull protests, the crew prepare for death, the boat reaches the bottom of the sea and finds... nothing. Her final dive continues, the pressure begins to relent, but the depth gauge is useless. They have gone miles down. Hundreds of miles, thousands... And so it goes on. And on board the crew succumb to madness, betrayal, religious mania and murder. Has the Plongeur left the limits of our world and gone elsewhere? Contains 33 full-page pen and ink illustrations by acclaimed artist Mahendra Singh, who previously illustrated an edition of THE HUNTING OF THE SNARK. Adam Roberts and Mahendra Singh have revisited Jules Verne's classic SF novel, and together they have come up with a unique vision.

Adam Roberts is commonly described as one of the UK's most important writers of SF. He is the author of numerous novels and literary parodies. He is Professor of 19th-century literature at Royal Holloway, London University and has written a number of critical works on both SF and 19th-century poetry. He is a contributor to the SF ENCYCLOPEDIA.

"Wears a big grin...packed with sly jokes, puns and farcical moments. Blending the best of modern and older styles his prose is never less than an a delight. There's no one else writing material quite like this." 4.5 star review -- Guy Hadley * SFX * A sinuously clever homage to the godfather of the scientific romance, enhanced by Mahendra Singh's lovely engraving-style illustrations. -- James Lovegrove * FINANCIAL TIMES * He wryly riffs upon Verne's original prose, before slipping into his own accomplished contemporary style packed with humour, adventure and menace-providing the best of both underwater worlds. -- Brody Rossiter * Filminwords * The very detailed and intense drawings help bring the prose to life...the words are a splendid, exciting voyage into the blue deep -- Mark Watkins * Blast 1386 * The science is meticulous, and the fiction articulate. Twenty Trillion Leagues Under the Sea may have in the manner of smarts than heart, but I for one very much enjoyed the voyage -- Niall Alexander * Tor.com * trippy, thought provoking science fiction with classic heritage...a whale of a tale indeed -- Paul Holmes * The Eloquent Page * One of the few things you can be certain of when booking up a book by Adam Roberts is that it will be clever, quirky and a little strange. Twenty Trillion Leagues Under the Sea doesn't disappoint in any of the regards. * Starburst Magazine * an eye-popping and mind-blowing exploitative technique, and our author outdoes himself -- Paul De Fliippo * Locus * Twenty Trillion League Under the Sea combines the authors serious novels with his parodies. The result is something that is not quite different and British in style but utterly compelling from beginning to end * SF Book *