Author(s): Brian Aldiss

Science Fiction

It is the very near future.
Paul Ali, a young science fiction writer, who has the perceived misfortune of a Muslim heritage, has been arrested for no compelling reason. He is held as prisoner B, without a lawyer and isolated. Whenever the powers-that-be fancy a diversion, they beat him up. A foul-mouthed jobsworth subjects him to coarse and unremitting questioning. To escape from this humiliation prisoner B writes - in the privacy of his mind - a science fiction novel set on a planet in every sense a thousand light years away. But gradually the two worlds start to converge...

In the tradition of dystopias like 1984, this novel shocks and entertains.