Europe at Midnight

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This is the second installment of author Dave Hutchison's “The Fractured Europe Sequence.” I gave the first installment five stars but I noted that the reader should be warned that the first installment was not truly a complete novel so much as the first part of a larger novel. I think that observation implies a recommendation that a reader should start with the first book in order to get a full flavor for the backstory in this story and the clever way that his story hooks up with Europe in Autumn.

So, since the reader is duly warned to start with the first book, this review will contain spoilers for the prior book.

When we ended Europe in Autumn, we had followed Rudi from his evolution from chef to agent for Les Courier de Boise, and had learned about a Europe that had been ravaged by a mysterious Xian Flu and was devolving into smaller and smaller units. At the end, Rudi had stumbled onto a fantastical story about a family of Englishmen who had spent generations mapping a part of England that had never existed in our world, which is associated with an even more fantastic place called the Community. By the end of Autumn, we discover that the story isn't a fantasy....and the story ends.

This book picks up without Rudi. Instead, we are in a world that exists purely as English academia. The unnamed first-person narrator lives in the Campus, which we come to learn has a society organized around a university. Residents are Students, Teaching Assistants, Doctors, and Professors as a matter of heredity. The Campus is organized into geographic areas defined by the Faculty of Science, Law, Medicine, etc. There has been a revolution, ousting the Old Board. The New Board has discovered that the Old Board was sanctioning bizarre medical experiments and there are technological assets beyond its apparent early 20th century level of technology.

The narrator comes into contact with a mysterious woman who seems to know more about things than he does, which is interesting since he is the spy chief of the New Board. Then, he is forced to flee the Campus and comes to Europe. He becomes an intelligence asset who is used to infiltrate a spy cell for the Community and the Community itself.

We get a lot of information from the inside about the Community and the Campus.The Campus is a terrific bit of sociological imagination. I really enjoyed the detailing of the Campus and the claustrophobic storyline of conspiracies unknown and suspected. The move into the Community is equally good as we see a society where 19th century Toryism prevailed over radicalism and labor unions.

The writing is excellent with a lot of wry humor. The focal character is interesting and observant and likable. The story is filled with conflict and adventure which keeps it interesting.

What happened to Rudi? If you pay attention to the last several pages you can see where the conclusion of Midnight hooks up with the conclusion of Autumn. Since this is a story about topologically-related parallel universes, this bit of topological linkage is appropriate and clever.

I am doing something I hardly ever do, which is to immediately purchase and read the next installment.