Book description
From the author of Empire of the Sun and Crash comes an unnerving tale
of life in a modern tower block running out of control.
Within the concealing walls of an elegant forty-storey tower block, the
affluent tenants are hell-bent on an orgy of destruction. Cocktail
parties degenerate into marauding attacks on 'enemy' floors and the
once-luxurious amenities become an arena for riots and technological mayhem.
In this visionary tale of urban disillusionment, society slips into a
violent reverse as the isolated inhabitants of the high-rise, driven by
primal urges, recreate a dystopian world ruled by the laws of the
jungle. 'Ballard's finest novel…A triumph' THE TIMES
'Another eerie glimpse into the future. A fast-moving, spine-tingling
fable of the concrete jungle' DAILY EXPRESS
'A gripping read, particularly if you like your thrills chilly, bloody
and with claims to social relevance' TIME OUT
'Harsh and ingenious…HIGH-RISE is an intense and vivid bestiary, which
lingers unsettlingly in the mind' MARTIN AMIS, NEW STATESMAN J. G.
Ballard was born in 1930 in Shanghai. After internment in a civilian
prison camp, his family returned to England in 1946. His 1984 bestseller
Empire of the Sun won the Guardian Fiction Prize and the James Tait
Black Memorial Prize. His controversial novel Crash was made into a film
by David Cronenberg. His autobiography Miracles of Life was published in
2008, and a collection of interviews with the author, Extreme Metaphors,
was published in 2012. J. G. Ballard passed away in 2009.
