Hearts of Oak

Four people in an uncannily unchanging city come to question their reality in this piercing work. Iona, Steve, Saori, and Victor can’t remember a time when they didn’t live in the unnamed city or follow their daily routines. They go to work, go home, and repeat this cycle again the next day alongside their obedient, homogeneous fellow citizens. But the arrival of a stranger triggers repressed memories, sending all four hurtling into danger as they realize that the city is not a haven but a cage. Robson (Welcome to Our Village, Please Invade Carefully) is a master of the gradual release of information, ratcheting up the tension by degrees as both readers and characters learn the truth of his intricately constructed universe. The clipped, measured, and deceptively simple prose echoes the unnatural calm of the monotonous city and serves as a surprisingly effective vehicle as Powers raises questions about the nature of complacency and of humanity itself. Clever, emotional, and thematically rich, this is sure to please fans of classic science fiction. (Mar.)