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Sublimation
Isabel J. Kim, Picador (, )

In Sublimation, Isabel J. Kim imagines a world where someone attempting to cross an international border may end up splitting into two separate beings.

So, for example, if you were leaving your home country for pastures new but were torn about whether you were making the right decision, you might find yourself splitting into two at the airport. One “instance” of you would leave, and another would stay behind.

The instances are identical at the moment of cleaving, but after that, their memories and lives are their own… unless they happen to touch, flesh to flesh, in which case they may reintegrate, their two selves smashing together again.

It is undoubtedly a complicated premise, but don’t be put off. The execution is light and graceful, and the intricacies of the set-up prove both moving and thought-provoking. Kim makes the cleaving of a human in two feel very natural – the way the world has always been. She also uses an unusual second-person point of view. Two sample sentences: “You shake your head.” And: “You scratch the black cuff on your wrist.”

In less-sure hands, this might be confusing. Here, it is intimate and interesting. Our heroine is Soyoung, a young woman in Seoul. We first meet her as she mulls over whether reintegrating with your instance against their will amounts to murder: a gun on the wall if there ever was one.

Sublimation‘s premise is complicated, but don’t be put off. The execution is light and graceful

Soyoung has an instance she has never spoken to living in New York; that version of herself now calls herself Rose. Meanwhile, Soyoung’s best friend is a man named Yujin, and he also happens to have an instance living in New York. Yujin is very close to his instance, named YJ, and the pair are working together towards shared goals. They intend to reintegrate when they hit 30. Or at least, that was the original plan, but it has been a long time since they were one, so perhaps all is not what it seems.

When Rose returns to South Korea after the death of the grandfather she shares with Soyoung, she and Soyoung meet for the first time. It is an awkward meeting, because the two women don’t trust each other, and with good reason. Their reunion triggers dramatic events that will soon draw Yujin and his instance, YJ, into a high-stakes chain of events.

This is a taut psychological thriller, full of unexpected twists. It is fantastically well written and well constructed. I could have done without the more routine action thriller aspects, involving big tech and baddies being exposed. I’m not sure the book needed it with so much going on between our pairs of instances. But that’s a smallish gripe. This is tip-top stuff; a fantastic debut.

And a second recommendation this week, for those who like their sci-fi very cosy. by Rebecca Thorne is about an alien starship covered with intelligent… moss. Yes, Moss’d in Space is about moss. Or specifically, a moss organism called Moss. I thought the title was dreadful until I got into the book, at which point I decided it was genius.

Cosy fiction is absolutely not my thing, and this is marshmallow sweet, but I finished it because quality tells and this is quality. Thorne has the gift of being very funny, with the book’s humour elegantly wrought from the gulf between Moss’s idea of itself – as a delightful and easy-to-get-on-with person – and the reality of Moss’s sneaky, intransigent, easy-to-upset character. This is the first in a series, and it deserves to do well.

Emily recommends…

Book

Ellery Lloyd, Macmillan

Another new release this month, featuring journeys back in time to the London Blitz. This twisty time-travel thriller, which you can easily imagine going straight to film, is enjoyable and clever; in short, a romp

Emily H. Wilson is the author of the Sumerians series (Inanna, Gilgamesh and Ninshubar, all published by Titan) and she is currently working on her first sci-fi novel. She is a former editor of 91av and you can follow her on Instagram @emilyhwilson1

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