The Unit

Author: Ninni Holmqvist

The blurb that accompanies this novel compares it to Huxley and Orwell, but the work it most closely resembles is Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. In a clean, well-ordered, peaceful and happy future, men and women who have reached a certain age, unmarried, childless and without work, check into the Second Reserve Bank Unit. Here they live out their life in comfort and security, all their needs are catered for, and they are surrounded by companionable people just like themselves. The only cost is that their body parts are harvested for more productive members of society. Then two of the inmates fall in love, and what had seemed comforting and even pleasureable is suddenly revealed to be monstrous. Why it's on the list The Unit was first published in Sweden in 2006, not long after Ishiguro's novel appeared in Britain, so it is interesting to see how, even without a common language, science fictional ideas resonate across national borders.