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City Whitelight
City Whitelight was published in 1986 by Mainstream Publishing, Edinburgh and paperbacked the next year by Fontana, London.
It was adapted by the author as a Monday Night Theatre on BBC Radio 4.
City Whitelight is an explosive novel set against the process of social breakdown in an archetypal city - a city without any real place in geography or time, in a world which has become accustomed to eruptions of urban discontent. The surreal inner city environment created in the novel has obvious modern connotations.
Centrum, the area at the centre of John McKenzie's nightmare city, has over a period of time become encircled by a band of derelict wasteland, edged with wire and prowled by wild, savage dogs. Within the physical and economic decay of this inner city area, a plague had sprung up causing the ghetto to be completely isolated from the rest of the city .... or so it seems.
Jackie Whitelight becomes the leader of a youth gang in an effort to ease his attempt to flee from the city altogether. But his instinctive need to escape conflicts with his desire to help the Inner City when he discovers, during a foray into the Outer City, that a massive extermination programme is planned. He then encounters Gisler, the grotesque and obese ruler of the Inner City, and the Poison Maker, a dealer in drugs and a man of messianic delusions ...
City Whitelight is a novel of vivid characterisation written by a gifted Scottish storyteller. It is also a nightmarish, apocalyptic vision.
It was adapted by the author as a Monday Night Theatre on BBC Radio 4.
City Whitelight is an explosive novel set against the process of social breakdown in an archetypal city - a city without any real place in geography or time, in a world which has become accustomed to eruptions of urban discontent. The surreal inner city environment created in the novel has obvious modern connotations.
Centrum, the area at the centre of John McKenzie's nightmare city, has over a period of time become encircled by a band of derelict wasteland, edged with wire and prowled by wild, savage dogs. Within the physical and economic decay of this inner city area, a plague had sprung up causing the ghetto to be completely isolated from the rest of the city .... or so it seems.
Jackie Whitelight becomes the leader of a youth gang in an effort to ease his attempt to flee from the city altogether. But his instinctive need to escape conflicts with his desire to help the Inner City when he discovers, during a foray into the Outer City, that a massive extermination programme is planned. He then encounters Gisler, the grotesque and obese ruler of the Inner City, and the Poison Maker, a dealer in drugs and a man of messianic delusions ...
City Whitelight is a novel of vivid characterisation written by a gifted Scottish storyteller. It is also a nightmarish, apocalyptic vision.
- GenresScience Fiction
191 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1986
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October 7, 2012
Took a chance on the kindle edition and loved it. A sort of dungeon-punk urban (Scottish!) dystopia, great writing and characters - like the previous reviewer says, the feeling and atmosphere really lingers after finishing the story. My only complaint is I would have liked more, the ending certainly feels like a set-up for a sequel. Will certainly look into John McKenzies other books now.
Displaying 1 of 1 review