Indie

by Paul MacLeod

Midas had returned to Toronto with a new business plan. After years of big deals in the South, he decided to do it better. It was always so hard to make money and do good at the same time. With his indie café he’d do both. But this reinvention comes at a mysterious price as strange visitors arrive with insistent business propositions.
Making it more difficult, the town he’d left is as overwhelmed by the notorious sins as everywhere else, buckling under ecological decay, a weakened state, and rampant fraud and violence. As Midas defends his café, his world morphs in bizarre and threatening ways. One wonders if his growing horror is real or a distraught misperception of reality, and a clue comes from an unlikely place: his favourite customer.
Zora has her own troubles. A progressive artist, she’d recently quit a revolutionary movement, until she’s drawn back in. Zora’s journey and perception of reality morph too, and both she and Midas participate in a grander struggle over the absurd elusiveness of truth.

309 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 20, 2022

About the author

Paul practiced law and managed services for many years in the criminal justice system and has also spent a few years in private business on one foray or another. It’s been a varied career, he’s learned many things, and it’s been usually lots of fun. Those times when it’s been horrible have inspired him the most in his creative writing. He’s driven to express some essential human problems in somewhat fantastical ways, drawing on his twisted childhood imagination, the wisdom of teachers and colleagues and his experiences in work and life.

Reviews

[David Blankenship · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great story with a wild ride

The story begins with Midas, who owns an independent cafe in Toronto with a specialty in espressos. Different businesses people pick up an unusual interest in him and his cafe and he doesn’t understand why. Meanwhile, Zora finds an odd object she wants to give to Midas to add to his collection of historical and strange items on display in the cafe.

Midas and Zora progressively become separately entangled in conflicts between violent powers. They try to warn each other but one talks about magic and creatures while the other talks about a sort of espionage, and they each think the other sounds crazy.

There are a ton of twists and turns building up to a huge ending. I’d say it’s over all a dark dystopian story but with elements of sci-fi, fantasy, and a touch of noir.

5 for me and I definitely recommend checking it out!

[rod macleod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although this type of story is not my usual read I found myself feeling the tension and apprehension of the characters very strongly. The descriptions really made word pictures so that the images of the context were clear and vivid. When I read novels I am struck by how some authors can use the small details that build the image of place and person and so allow the reader to be there---- and throughout this book, " Indie" the author has achieved this in a most striking way so that although I did not want to be there with all the apprehension and confusion the characters experienced, it was inescapable and I needed to read on to find out how it resolved. So my congratulations to the author of "Indie".

[Sage Nestler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quick Take
Indie by Paul MacLeod is a beautifully written sci-fi thriller that reads like a fever dream. MacLeod’s writing is smooth and vibrant, and his passion for his story leaps from the page. Fans of sci-fi are sure to be transformed after ingesting this read!

Tell Me More
I’ve always been interested in sci-fi, but I have to admit that I am fairly new to reading it. Indie by Paul MacLeod was a great book to read as a new fan, because it was easy to understand and utterly captivating.

Indie by Paul MacLeod is a dystopian/apocalyptic sci-fi novel that focuses on Midas, a man who runs his indie cafe in a world that is that is becoming increasingly violent and disastrous. The novel follows his journey as he tries to defend his cafe, but his world quickly becomes corrupted. The casual setting of the cafe in a world that is impacted by such extreme sci-fi elements is intriguing and blends the importance of human relationships in a decaying world with existential dread.

Zora, an artist with revolutionary interests, was by far my favorite character in Indie. She elicits the “manic pixie dream girl” complex, but while she possesses the characteristics of this trope, her character is an independent and essential element to the novel. She is creative, marches to the beat of her own drum, and while stuck in a world that is frequently changing and further deteriorating, she stands her ground. Zora’s and Midas’ chemistry oozes from the pages of the book, and I quickly became engrossed in their relationship.

With Indie, MacLeod has proven himself to be a deeply passionate and unrepeated author. He managed to create a sci-fi novel that not only explores apocalyptic elements but is filled with philosophical interests and deep relationships that allow the reader to reflect on their own life. There are so many ways to interpret this novel, and I was thoroughly impressed with the prose. Indie is MacLeod’s first novel, and with it he has created a lifelong reader of his work in myself.

If you are a sci-fi fan and enjoy philosophy and complex interpersonal relationships, Indie by Paul MacLeod deserves to be on the top of your to be read list. This author is sure to go far.

[Shaun Poisson-Fast · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book! Lots of layers here ranging from page-turning to thought-provoking. For me, this book was an invitation to reflect on the concept of Indie (as in the Independent small business owner, artist , musician, writer, whatever) as the pursuit of authenticity, by operating outside of dominant market forces, yet inevitably vulnerable to conventional power structures in increasing degrees of diabolical corruption. The book uses vivid and symbolically potent locations that will stay with me for some time, like the stage in the back of the café: a live performance space in disuse, and relegated to the storage of stolen cultural artifacts. The surrealism in this story, with its unnatural (at times Bulgakovian) happenings, villainous caricatures, and mythic artifacts both intrigue and disorient. For me, the dystopic setting was not so much about highlighting current social or ecological ills: no preaching moral imperatives here. Rather, the bleak world in this book is an exaggeration of our world, where what passes for authentic value is often stollen, derivative and ultimately corruptible. But also a world where value is regained through the transformative and transportive potential of friendship, trust, and the creative leap; a world where “Indie” is not just about operating outside of the dominant aesthetic, but requires both acts of resistance and acts of creation: creating, and jumping into, new economies, new realities.

[Ruth Collier · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's great to be able to start the new year on a good book and a good review! I was totally drawn in by this book. It's hard to pin it down to a genre, it's got a futuristic-noir feel, some fantasy/cosmic horror elements and some thriller plot points. There's suspicious characters, plots and double dealing, a talking blue dog and a creepy painting... Confused? Good.
What I really enjoyed about this story was the mood and feel of the world, gritty but surreal. Some of the descriptions and dialogue are just slightly off-kilter which makes you feel you are in a world just a bit different to our own. The mood was something like 'a scanner darkly', 'naked lunch' (but much less confusing) and David Bowie's 'Outside' album. But I'm purely going from mood for these comparisons, not plot.
It's probably not for everyone. Some of the descriptions and plot points are a little confusing, but then sometimes the characters thoughts and dialogue seem to state the obvious a little. I thought this balanced out quite well (and the confusing bits were probably deliberate) but I can see how some could find it irritating or inconsistent. There's a still a bit of mystery in the ending, so not for those who like everything to be neatly tied up.
But these are just minor warnings/quibbles, on the whole I thought this book was fantastic and I am very glad I picked up a copy.