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Rushing to Paradise (1994)
Author: Simon Sellars • Sep 7th, 2006 •Category: bibliography, enviro-disaster

OPENING LINE:
” ‘Save the albatross! Stop nuclear testing now!’ “.
From the 1994 Picador edition:
Led by a charismatic and slightly unhinged woman, a group of environmentalists wins control over a small atoll in the Pacific and sets up a utopian community. Breeding other threatened species and among themselves, these homesteaders slowly transform an Eden of their own into a much darker place. A savage send up of environmentalism, feminism, and extremism of all sorts, Rushing to Paradise is also a brave new exploration of that strange territory J.G. Ballard has illuminated over the course of his career: the twentieth century.”
A much-maligned work, Rushing to Paradise nevertheless has its adherents. Marcus Moure wrote an impassioned review for Spike Magazine, calling it a “cross between Greenpeace-gone-black and Golding’s Lord of the Flies … Ballard’s most powerful novel in years, a terrifying, all-too-real “what if.” Which is exactly what Ballard does best, what-iffing Armageddon-like possibilities in this paradise we call Earth.”
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Author:
Simon Sellars
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Simon Sellars
Newer: The Kindness of Women (1991) »
I think this is his best novel. I like the pace and it’s full of all of his themes and obsessions. Dr. Barbara’s transformation as the book progresses is perhaps Ballard’s best female character. I also see alot of young Jim from EOS in Neil.