Europe at Dawn

The final (?) novel in Dave Hutchinson's Fractured Europe series is another cracking mix of thriller and espionage set in an alternative future Europe.

The novel opens with a short little chapter about a couple who buy a narrowboat, do it up and occasionally transport people to certain locations. It's another short character study, the kind that Hutchinson favoured to excess in Europe in Winter. The rest of the first half of the book is devoted to two people - the migrant Benno, trapped on a barren island in the Med along with thousands of other illegal immigrants; and Alice, who works for the Scottish Embassy in Tallin, Estonia. Both their lives become intertwined and change dramatically when they get mixed up with the Coureurs de Bois, the semi-mythic covert operations that recruited Rudi in Europe in Autumn.

As the story proceeds it's clear that Hutchinson has taken us back in time to the years before the disappearance of the Line, the sovereign nation that was also a trans-European railway, at the end of Europe in Winter. So we work our way towards that significant event and the revelation of the Community, the pocket universe country that exists topologically in the same space as Europe. By the end of this first half of the story, both Benno and Alice's lives are unrecognisable. It's brilliantly conceived and written and would be a novel in it's own right in others hands.

The second half of the novel is where we again encounter Rudi, and Rupert from Europe at Midnight, as Hutchinson attempts to tie up all the loose ends and explain exactly what has been going on. Rudi is tasked by both The Community and The Line to find out who the shadowy “third player” is in this world of pocket universes and topological manipulation. There are revelations aplenty, as it's revealed that people are not quite who you thought they were. The denouement, by narrowboat from Wolverhampton (of all places!), is quite unexpected and pleasing. But he also teases a possible continuation because it seems America might also be a player in this game.

It's another excellent thriller from Hutchinson. The entire series should, I think, be read as one long novel. It has many layers and levels and can be a bit confusing at times, but I think it would repay a reread. It's certainly one of the great feats of imaginative, speculative fiction this century.

Rudi abides.

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I've been a faithful reader of this “sequence” and my feelings are ambivalent. The “Fractured Europe Sequence” is not really a series. It actually is a single book published in parts over the course of years. The nature of the reading experience made following the storyline difficult. In addition, this story is basically a spy story where everything is nuanced and shadowy.

Before I get into review proper, let me advise anyone who hasn't read the previous books - Do not start with this book. This book is the last part of a larger novel. It will make no sense to you by itself.

Now, here there be spoilers.

The world is unusual and yet surprisingly familiar in this the Year of Our Lord 2020. In the recent past, Europe was ravaged by the Xian Flu, which triggered an epidemic of devolution, as parts of countries separate and secede from each other.

Rudi made his appearance on the first book as he became acquainted with the mysterious organization known as Les Coureurs des Bois, whose mission is to get things through these new borders. In the first book, we watch Rude learn tradecraft through a variety of missions that do not cohere into a single narrative. At the end of the first book, Rudi discovers that there is a pocket universe called the “Community” which is accessed at odd spots in our world abut spans Europe in a starnage topological overlay.

Book two introduced us to Rupert took us to a pocket universe - the Campus - where society is a college campus. Rupert is the security chief of one faction of this society, which is in the midst of a revolution. There is some interconnection with our world and the Community. It seems that this unversity world is where the Xian Flu came from. At the end, Rupert defects to our world as the Campus is destroyed in a nuclear attack.

In the third book, Rudi returns and pursues his own mysterious history in the Couriers. He becomes involved in some subtle missions concerning a mathematician who seems to have the key to creating pocket universes. At the end of the book we get a hint that there may be an ever more secret group involved in the struggle between the Community and Europe.

Throughout these books, the most interesting creation has been “the Line,” which is a Europe-spanning railroad that is its own nation. The Line seems to play an important role in these stories but is very mysterious.

The final book opens with a new character, Ben, who is a Somali refugee on an island in the Mediterranean. He is recruited and, then, disappears from the story until he gets a walk-on at the end. The rest of the first 70% of this book is like that. Things happen but it isn't clear what is happening, whether we should care, and what is important. There is a long extended section involving Alice, who is a Scottish embassy official, who gets played in a gambit involving a jeweled skull. Is she imporant? What about the person she meets, who is affiliated with some organization, but which we don't know? And then there are the references to the “William Dancy Reading Group,” which has become a charity involved in providing medical equipment. What's that all about?

Honestly, at 60% of the way, I was ready to quit on the grounds that this story was going nowhere.

I was impressed with the topological nature of the books. For example, it seems that a large part of the Alice section happens before the events of other books. I wondered if there was a clue in that feature.

However, I persevered and, as in the other books, there was a big pay-off in the end. We learn who the other player in the struggle was. The Whitcomb-Whites - the mysterious creators of the pocket universe - make a reappearance. We learn what role the Line plays. We see the games within games of the Community and the European intelligence agencies. Rupert is a key player and gets revenge for the destruction of his world.

However, there were some notes that left me dissatisfied. I don't know if I missed them or if they were there all along. For example, I don't think the jeweled skull showed up in earlier books. I missed the role played by Araminta Delahunty and Andrew Molson. I don't know if I was dense or the clues were too subtle for me to pick up on.

In any event, the ending redeemed the book and the series for me. I have always liked the imaginative construction of this world and I've considered the characters to be well-drawn. I also like nuanced spy stories that cause me to reconsider what I thought was true and false.