By Jane Rawson

Picador, out 18 April

A shipwreck leaves a traveller stranded on a foreign shore…

There are certain books that you read, with little foreknowledge of anything beyond its widest parameters, that grab you in the first couple of chapters and demand that you read them immediately – not racing through the pages, because they’re not that sort of “page-turner”, but at a speed that allows you to absorb the incredible number of ideas that are being thrust at you.

From the Wreck is very much a book in that category.

The first couple of chapters demonstrate its breadth, showing an encounter between a man, a woman and some horses that feels perfectly normal (or at least slightly eccentric) at first… but then is retold from a completely different perspective that makes you challenge what and how you see things.

Such challenging is at the heart of Rawson’s tale – the characters challenge themselves as to what’s happening, and are challenged by those around them. Some are affected by the genre element of this story; others are not – their challenges come from making a life for themselves and those they love in an environment that is as alien to them as Earth would be to a creature from a far galaxy.

There’s tragedy and joy intermingled within these pages, and just when you think you’ve got a handle on how the story is unfolding, something happens to make you reassess all you’ve read to date. Don’t be spoiled – allow the story to spoil you.

Verdict: A captivating piece of historical fiction, and an equally impressive science fiction tale. Recommended. 9/10

Paul Simpson