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The Dark Manual
Susie Sakamoto, an Irishwoman in Japan, spends her days drinking heavily and cursing the home robot that takes care of all her domestic needs. She despises the thing her dead husband designed and is under the impression that it is about to do her harm.
To escape the overwhelming grief of her missing family, she takes to the nighttime and the lawless section of the city, loitering in seedy bars with her wild, drug-fuelled, hypersexual friend, Mixxy.
Are Susie’s persecutions merely a result of her own paranoia? Can the parliament of owls gathering eerily in the trees outside be of any significance, any assistance? Or will she have to search for the mythic Dark Manual, to find a way to finally switch off the homebot and end her litany of woes?
…it might already be too late…the machines are on the rise.
Japan-based award-winning Irish writer Colin O’Sullivan couples his usual lyrical flourishes with tense and often terrifying noir-ish scenes, to present before us an unsettling vision of an anxious woman teetering in an anxious time. Fans of "Black Mirror", the dark humour of early Haruki Murakami, and even Asimov or Aldiss, will be keen to sample another frantic foray into a near and nervy future.
To escape the overwhelming grief of her missing family, she takes to the nighttime and the lawless section of the city, loitering in seedy bars with her wild, drug-fuelled, hypersexual friend, Mixxy.
Are Susie’s persecutions merely a result of her own paranoia? Can the parliament of owls gathering eerily in the trees outside be of any significance, any assistance? Or will she have to search for the mythic Dark Manual, to find a way to finally switch off the homebot and end her litany of woes?
…it might already be too late…the machines are on the rise.
Japan-based award-winning Irish writer Colin O’Sullivan couples his usual lyrical flourishes with tense and often terrifying noir-ish scenes, to present before us an unsettling vision of an anxious woman teetering in an anxious time. Fans of "Black Mirror", the dark humour of early Haruki Murakami, and even Asimov or Aldiss, will be keen to sample another frantic foray into a near and nervy future.
- GenresScience Fiction
284 pages, Paperback
Published May 10, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 6, 2024
If you're coming to this novel, after watching the AppleTV adaptation, "Sunny," expecting an equally whimsical and colorful story of grief and conspiracy, you're probably going to be disappointed.
This is a darker and more somber tale that feels like an alternate version of the streaming series.
Also, lots of talk of owls.
This is a darker and more somber tale that feels like an alternate version of the streaming series.
Also, lots of talk of owls.
May 1, 2022
A very quick read. I felt the book didn’t start until about half way through. The first half was mood setting, the second was quick moving but perhaps too short…long enough to get an idea across, not long enough to build a canonical story with fully drawn characters.
February 17, 2022
Enjoyable enough and often well written when the overused alliteration took a back seat, but it ultimately felt like a short story padded out to novel length.
August 16, 2024
what happens when grief is all youre left with in the world
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews