An eco-activist group bites off more than it can chew when it accepts funding from a billionaire. Birnam Wood is an eco-activist group, guerilla gardeners who descend on vacant plots of land and plant small food crops. The grass roots collective is run along non-hierarchical lines, yet real power in the group resides with its founder, the emotionally and philosophically complex Mira Bunting. Mira is your proverbial angry left wing activist, ready to make revolution and bring down the whole corrupt capitalist system. Despite Birnam Wood's egalitarian aims, with its eschewing of vertical power structures, the membership is revolting. Shelley, second in command in all but name, has a long list of private grievances against Mira. She secretly wants to leave. Ideologically pure Tony has returned from exile to confront the hypocrisy he sees in the group, making an uncomfortable scene. Enter Robert Lemoine, billionaire drone manufacturer and tech wizard. He's about to seal a purchase for a cattle station and surrounding land with owners Owen and Jill Darvish. Owen, now Sir Owen, has just received a knighthood for his contributions to the environment – a ridiculous honour, considering his past as a pest controller. Sir Owen has set up a business with Robert Lemoine's drone company, Autonomo, to monitor at-risk species, hence the knighthood. All of this makes Mira's very blood boil. She investigates the Darvish property, with ideas of doing some planting. It is here she runs into Lemoine. The canny Mira has soon met her match when she tries to conceal her intentions and Lemoine checkmates her. Nonetheless, a deal is soon hammered out. Funding for Birnam Wood, in exchange for the environmental gloss the partnership will give to Lemoine's drone business. But Robert Lemoine is not to be trusted, not even at this level. He's up to his eyeballs in some of the most evil business practices imaginable. Eleanor Catton won the Booker in 2013 for The Luminaries. Birnam Wood is her follow up. It's been worth the wait. Part eco-thriller, part satire on left wing politics, Birnam Wood is expertly plotted and has the suspense of a ticking time bomb. The cast of characters is superbly drawn, especially the self-satisfied middle class, middle aged couple, Sir Owen and Lady Jill Darvish. The dialogue is refreshingly real and tone perfect, capturing speech heard regularly in everyday life. Catton has a sharp eye and is an astute observer of life, of our vanities and frailties, which she conveys with peerless skill on the page. A classic page-turning thriller, with a rogue's gallery of do-gooders, baddies and the plain indifferent, whose indifference allows the worst to happen. The shock ending will leave the reader reeling for days. Don't miss it! Birnam Wood, by Eleanor Catton. Published by Granta. $32.99 Review by Chris Saliba Comments are closed.
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