The middle classes could be first in the firing line, says Alex Makepeace.
Elsewhen Press, an indie publisher specialising in speculative fiction, is delighted to announce the timely Canaries, a political thriller by Alex Makepeace set in a Britain where a new government swiftly imposes its radical agenda.
Alex chose to set his story amid ‘the kind of comfortable middle classes who believe they are untouchable’ to chart how flimsy the fabric of institutions and even friendship can prove when times change.
Housing manager Bryan and his stay-at-home husband Phillip think little about how the new government will affect them, but when the police and social services arrive to remove their adopted children, they go on the run and soon find out who their friends really are.
Award-winning author Trevor Wood says: “Canaries chronicles the anaconda-like embrace of an authoritarian regime around its unsuspecting victims until it’s too late… at least for some.”
Alex explains: “Canaries was written before the US Supreme Court ruled against Roe v Wade, and the government of my home country, Italy, banned gay adoption and removed non-biological parents from birth certificates. I was saddened, but not surprised.”
He was inspired by his experience as one of the ‘losers’ of Britain’s Brexit vote: “As a Briton living in Italy, I was one of millions across Europe who realised the foundations upon which I had constructed my life were built on sand. A right I had grown up with and considered ‘inalienable’ vanished overnight. Canaries is not a story ‘about’ Brexit, but it would not exist without it.”
Aptly, Edwin Hayward, author of Slaying Brexit Unicorns: The Truth about our Decision to Leave the EU, wrote: “I blew through Canaries. It’s been a very long time since a novel sunk its hooks into me to such an extent, events tumbling faster and faster like a pebble caught in an avalanche. As a sense of glacial horror overwhelmed me, I kept wanting to reassure myself that it was safely fiction, but if I sleep badly tonight, I’ll know where to direct the blame.”
Peter Buck, Editorial Director at Elsewhen Press, says, “When Alex approached us with Canaries, we were immediately riveted by its powerful message. Now it is about to be published, that message has become even more relevant and more urgent. It may be set in a near-future, but it is certainly not fantasy.”
At its heart, Canaries is about the human price of politics. In his notes, Alex concludes that George Orwell’s ‘common decency’ may one day be all that stands between us and the knock at the door.
Canaries, is available from today in both eBook and paperback editions.
