Books

Mappa Mundi

The Map of
everything you know
everything you are
everything you ever will be
just got rewritten

Winner of the 2000 amazon.co.uk Writers' Bursary

Shortlisted for the 2001 Arthur C Clarke Award

Mappa Mundi is a near future thriller, set so close to our own world that, with a few technological exceptions, it is the same place. At the time of imagining those exceptions I thought they would seem about twenty years ahead. But already they're nearly all here, which goes to show you that nothing dates faster than the future.

The key conceit of Mappa Mundi is the development of a nanotechnology which is capable of switching nerve cells on and off within the human nervous system, including the brain. By controlling the information across the whole nervous network, the technology can theoretically control everything about the user, from their identity to their endocrine reactions. The struggle for control of this technology forms the larger plot sweep of the story.

The title, Mappa Mundi, is a Latin name meaning 'map of the world'. In the 13th century these maps were rare and precious items, akin to modern day encyclopaedias. They would not only show where the land and water lay, but also contain information about major towns and cities, who lived there, what the people were like and what exotic animals or precious things may be found.

Each map was in itself a whole story of the world, written on a single animal hide. As a result they are are marvels of compressed information and artistry. If you live in the
UK you can see a Mappa Mundi on permanent display at Hereford Cathedral. Few of these wonderful objects survive today, and to a modern eye their visions are unrecognisable as being true representations of the globe. But in their day they were the ultimate information, available only to those wealthy enough to own them and privileged enough to have learned to read.

In my book the secret project to develop the mind-technology is namedafter these ancient objects, the idea being that every one of us isa living, breathing map of the world. Through our experiences we define the meanings that we give to each and every thing we encounter, be it real, imaginary or abstract. The composite of those meanings is our identity, and our identity is something we have created, deliberately or not. Changing our identity changes our experience of the world. Changing our identity is the goal of the project called Mappa Mundi.

As you may imagine, not every person in the story wants to change us for the better. In fact the most obvious application of such a technology would be as a tool for social control. This theme has already been dealt with in such excellent books as Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley, and 1984, by George Orwell. My slant on the theme comes in at an earlier stage in the game, before the ability is with us, but when its fate and ours still hang in the balance.

The question isn't whether mass social controls are good or bad but whether it has ever been possible to be free in the way we like to imagine that we are. Isn't the fixity of your own identity - as limited and inaccurate as an old Mappa Mundi - already a prison enough?

Reviews

Vector, the critical journal of the British Science Fiction Association: "This is cracking stuff, a helter-skelter of speculative science and transcendant SF..."

SF Site: "Once in a great while you stumble upon a book that gets a firm grip on your imagination and just will not let go. Even when you are out - driving, eating in a restaurant, carrying on a conversation - you're thinking about that book, anxious to get back to find out what happens next. Enter into that restrictive list, Mappa Mundi..."

Entertainment Weekly,  September 15, 2006

: "

For fans of Brave New World or Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, if they met Thomas Pynchon in a cybercafé. Lowdown: A lyrical, attentively written anti-utopia. Grade: A-

           

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* PublishersWeekly, Sept. 2006: ""..this near-future SF thriller presents convincing characters caught in profound moral dilemmas brought home through exquisite attention to plot details and setting.""