For support, advice (both moral and editorial), and late nights on Twitter, my thanks to Lauren Beukes, Joelle Charbonneau, Kim Curran, Will Hill, Laura Lam, Lou Morgan, Emma Newman, James Smythe, Steve Weddle, Chuck Wendig and Jennifer Williams.
Special thanks to Mur Lafferty, whose ear I was able to bend, and bend frequently, during the course of writing and editing this book. The gin is (still) on me.
Thanks once more to the Angry Robot team, in particular my editor Lee Harris, as well as Marc Gascoigne and Darren Turpin. And thanks to Will Staehle for yet another glorious cover.
As a writer, inspiration sometimes comes from the strangest – and saddest – of places. Evelyn McHale jumped from the 86th floor observation deck of the Empire State Building on May 1st, 1947, and landed on the roof of a United Nations limousine. A few minutes later, Robert Wise took a photograph of her body, which ran as a full page in Life magazine a couple of weeks later. This photo, which became known as “The Most Beautiful Suicide”, was later used by Andy Warhol for a print entitled “Suicide (Fallen Body)”. For more information about Evelyn, and the photograph, visit http://www.codex99.com/photography/43.html.
Finally, to Sandra, my wife, forever supportive, even on those too-frequent days when I had to shut myself away from the world to get the work done. Here’s another one, just for you.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Adam Christopher was born in Auckland, New Zealand, and grew up watching Pertwee-era Doctor Who and listening to The Beatles, which isn’t a bad start for a child of the Eighties. In 2006, Adam moved to the North West of England, where he can be found drinking tea and obsessing over superhero comics and The Cure.
adamchristopher.co.uk
twitter.com/ghostfinder
THE AGE ATOMIC PLAYLIST
Music is important to me during the writing and editing of any book, and The Age Atomic was no exception. Here’s a list of ten tracks I had on high-rotate for the last nine months. Each captures a moment or a mood of the story, from the epic melancholy of Plainsong that seems to describe Evelyn’s sadness, to the classic Harlem jazz of Duke Ellington that might have floated around the King of 125th Street’s theater workshop.
1. The Cure – Plainsong
From the album Disintegration (Fiction Records, 1989)
2. Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong – Drop Me Off In Harlem
From the album The Great Summit – The Master Takes (Roulette Records, 1961)
3. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Generation
From the album Take Them On, On Your Own (Virgin Records, 2003)
4. The Bird and the Bee – Preparedness
From the album The Bird and the Bee (Blue Note Records, 2007)
5. The Velvet Underground – Ocean (outtake)
From the album Loaded: The Fully Loaded Edition (Rhino Records 1997)
6. Duke Ellington – Take The A Train (live)
From the album Ellington at Newport (Columbia Records, 1956)
7. Wild Flag – Boom
From the album Wild Flag (Merge Records, 2011)
8. Dubstar – Everyday I Die
From the album Random, Volume 1: A Gary Numan Tribute (Blanco Y Negro, 1997)
9. Arcade Fire – Black Mirror
From the album Neon Bible (Merge Records, 2007)
10. Count Basie – Midnite Blue
From the album The Atomic Mr. Basie (Roulette Records, 1957)
THE AGE ATOMIC
“If you're not careful, Adam Christopher will melt your face off with The Age Atomic: the heat of the prose pairs with searing action. This is fireball storytelling and a rare follow-up that's better than its predecessor.”
Chuck Wendig, author of Blackbirds
“Adam Christopher's debut novel is a noir, Philip K Dick-ish science fiction superhero story... a novel of surreal resonances, things that are like other things, plot turns that hearken to other plot turns. It's often fascinating, as captivating as a kaleidoscope... just feel it in all its weird glory.”
Cory Doctorow, New York Times-bestselling author of Makers and Little Brother
“Christopher's tightly plotted novel is a truly original debut that, while subtly referencing Orwell, Kafka, Marvel comics and Philip K Dick, manages to maintain its own distinctive tone – a genuine pathos and longing for something elusively other. Recommended.”
The Guardian
“Adam Christopher maintains a punchy, bestseller prose style that keeps the action rocketing along, and protagonists that seem right both in their own setting, and appropriate to what we already recognise as super heroes. Empire State is an excellent, involving read, and it fully deserves to be the start of a new universe.”
Paul Cornell, author of London Falling
“A daring, dreamlike, almost hallucinatory thriller, one that plays with the conventions of pulp fiction and superheroes like a cat with a ball of yarn.”
Kurt Busiek, Eisner Award-winning writer of Astro City and Marvels
“As it happens, I'm a sucker for hard-boiled retro sci-fi stories; rocket-powered superheroes, spunky dames, fedoras, Studebakers slewing round gritty Gotham street-corners on two wheels, and Adam Christopher sure knows his way around a tightly spun yarn – I was a pig in poop from page one! As they say: This story? She's a real sweater-full, with a great pair'a getaway sticks... Watch out for this Adam kid, he's nobody's sap. He's got a sharp nib and a sharper wit. He'd steal your last few hours before you could say 'cat's pajamas', and you'd thank him for it.”
Billy Campbell, star of The Rocketeer
ANGRY ROBOT
A member of the Osprey Group
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Nottingham,
NG1 1HW, UK
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Long Island City,
NY 11101
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www.angryrobotbooks.com
Rad’s Universal Robots
Copyright © Seven Wonders Ltd 2013
Cover art by Will Staehle
Distributed in the United States by Random House, Inc., New York.
All rights reserved.
Angry Robot is a registered trademark, and the Angry Robot icon a trademark of Angry Robot Ltd.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
ISBN: 978 0 85766 315 3
Contents
The Age Atomic
Also by Adam Christopher
Dedication
Part One - The Girl Who Fell
Chapter One
Part Two - Winter's Tale
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Part Three - Fearful Engines
Chap
ter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-One
Chapter Fifty-Two
Chapter Fifty-Three
Chapter Fifty-Four
Chapter Fifty-Five
Chapter Fifty-Six
Epilogue - Regime Change
Epilogue - The Cloud Club
Acknowledgements
About the Author
The Age Atomic Playlist
The Age Atomic
Imprint
The Age Atomic Page 30