Book Review: Sweet Harmony by Claire North

Claire North's new book is only £1.99 on Kindle, and I highly recommend it.

This is a perfect novella. It is the sort of Sci-Fi which adds only one new thing to our world, then plays out the unintended consequences.

What if you had nano-bots keeping you healthy? And what if you paid for upgrades? And then - what if you couldn't keep up with your payments and your health was repossessed?

Obviously it invites comparisons to Black Mirror. As a study in human weakness and gentle dystopian nightmares, it is a triumph. Harsher than anything Charlie Booker's team has come up with yet.

At its heart is the issue of who controls a woman's body. Is it her boyfriend? Her mother? Society's expectations? Her employer? Advertisers? Her doctors? It certainly isn't her. Even when she's making choices, her idea of normal is drawn from a polluted ecosystem.

What about you? Obviously you don't have nano-bots. But what mindless purchases are you making? Are you convincing yourself that your happiness rests on "just one more..."?

I'm a huge fan of Claire North's books and this cements her place as a first rate writer of sci-fi.