STAMPING BUTTERFLIES tells the story of two dreamers. One, a would be assassin in tomorrow's Marrakech. He aims to kill the US President and holds in his head the secret to a faster-than-light drive. The other, a Chinese Emperor, ruler of 148 billion people on an immense Dyson sphere thousands of years in the future. Each believes they are dreaming the other. One must change the future, one must change the past. Both have only days to live.This is a fast moving unusually well written SF novel of ideas. Ideas that will change the reader's perception of time and fate. Ideas from the cutting edge of hard science. It is peopled with vivid characters and evocative of Marrakech, where the author has lived.
Industry Reviews
'This is a virtuoso lesson in bringing artistic unity to radically dissonant elements. It is also the novel of a writer with real heart. STAMPING BUTTERFLIES is a book written with superb technique by a writer who never forgets that technique alone is not the whole point.' -- Roz Kaveney TIME OUT "Turning the idea of the past determining the future upside down, this thriller takes an attempted assassination of the US President in the Seventies and an emperor awaiting his death in ancient China and creates a riveting read." ESQUIRE "Grimwood imbues his creations with startling psychological complexity. Marrakech is brought to vivid life, along with its inhabitants. Grimwood has produced, imago-like, an inspiring butterfly of humanity and hope from a hard shell of despair." -- Eric Brown THE GUARDIAN 'Grimwood has written some of the best SF in the world over the past five years and Stamping Butterflies continues his journey to greatness. The kind of delirious head trip that leaves your brain quietly fizzing... Stamping Butterflies is proof of how SF can be both experimental and highly relevant.' SFX 'Incredibly cool, incredibly stylish, distinctly nasty in places... another dose of classic Grimwood.' ALIEN ON LINE 'A widescreen imagination and a sharp political edge. Grimwood wraps up his anger and his compassion in a wry trademark obliqueness that stabs you through from angles you don't expect.' -- Richard Morgan 'Stamping Butterflies is a revelation. A tapestry of narrative threads, each one slyly beautiful... With a literary ambition that puts most mainstream novels to shame.' -- Stephen Baxter 'Grimwood has written some of the best SF in the world over the past five years and Stamping Butterflies continues his journey to greatness.' -- SFX Review of 2004 'A mature, often alarming, deep and admirable work of fiction' -- Adam Roberts 'Stamping Butterflies is JCG's most ambitious novel to date, and perhaps his best... A major novel from an author who deserves to be called one of the major figures of the new British SF. -- Gary Wolfe LOCUS "Forget The Matrix, this is far more sophisticated and sexy. Mind-bendingly good." COSMOPOLITAN 'Clever, wise, and enigmatic, Stamping Butterflies has great relevance to the times in which we live... The writing achieves a clarity most writers die trying to achieve -- Jeff Vandermeer "Future near and far collide in Jon Courtenay Grimwood's latest complex work. The stories intertwine tantalisingly, their resolution shocks" -- Liz Sourbut NEW SCIENTIST "There's some sex, some violence, some politics, some drugs... another trip to familiar Moroccan terrirtory." -- Daniel McBeal FOCUS "Grimwood is a formidably skilled writer and he rewards a skilled reader. The risks Grimwood takes are substantial. The rewards for the reader even more so. Stamping Butterflies is an utterly entertaining enigma." -- Rick Kleffel Interzone "This is nothing less than a monumental achievement. A quite amazing novel." -- Paul Billinger Vector
