Last Light
by Alex Scarrow
Orion, HK$112
Writers have long dreamed up all manner of ways for the world to end. Alien invasion, nuclear holocaust, French descendants of Jesus, records by Duran Duran (I made that last one up). In Alex Scarrow's debut, the baddie is Mother Nature. Or rather, what the human race has wrought upon our maternal host. A political crisis in the Middle East leads to an almost complete cessation of oil production across the globe. This in turn leads to an almost complete cessation of food, power and clean water. Where do these blockbuster chaps find their ideas? This credible premise is what makes Last Light such an effective page turner: Scarrow has a great deal of scary fun with theories such as Peak Oil and the all-too-real phenomenon of panic buying. What is especially impressive here is that the plot and characters live up to his central idea. Normally, a novel destined for an airport contains people and prose as wooden as the leg Long John Silver uses to kick Jim Hawkins. Scarrow, in contrast, has a keen eye for the minutiae of human life and emotions. This elevates his characters (which are the usual mixture of scientists, attractive estranged wives and comely children) beyond the norm. Last Light is rather good for a first book.
