Review by Booklist Review
The fictional realms Ball (The Diver's Game, 2019) constructs are unnerving in their depictions of social and physical austerity, facades behind which emotions roil. In this bleak world, Abel, a sanitation worker, is called to much-dreaded jury duty He joins hundreds of the summoned in an enormous building, where they're treated like prisoners while being methodically and brutally vetted to serve as the one to decide the fate of the accused, whose day in court consists of being dragged into the repeat room, a psychological torture chamber. The cold calculation behind this cruel winnowing is explained to Abel as he advances through the harrowing process: "We are choosing a new society." The perspective shifts to that of a boy in the repeat room, who recounts his surreal childhood, a heartless parenting experiment in deprivation in which he and his sister are forced to enact monstrous scenarios designed to squash their sense of self. Ball's vision is chilling, his writing flawless in this stark, grueling tale of humans bereft of care and compassion, of love denied, sanity endangered, and judgement weaponized.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In the loosely sketched dystopian world of Ball's blistering latest (after the memoir Autoportrait), trials are conducted by ordinary people who gain access to the mind of the accused. Several decades into the future, following the dissolution of an unnamed country's "primitive" criminal justice system, garbageman Abel Cotter is chosen to act as judge and juror in the trial of a teenage boy for an unspecified capital crime. (One way the totalitarian government remains in control is by keeping its laws secret, so people never know whether they're breaking them.) In the second of the book's two parts, Ball switches to the unnamed boy's point of view, telling the story of his life as it's witnessed by Abel through a kind of consciousness-melding technology. It would be a spoiler to reveal the details of the boy's lurid and painful story, which casts him as a victim of his circumstances. Ball's tragic character study of the accused stands in stark relief to the chilling depiction of the court system and its low estimation of human life ("The more people think people have value, the worse they are at killing them," an official explains to Abel). This strikes a chord. (Sept.)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
In an arcane future legal system, a garbage collector is called to serve as a jury of one. With his enigmatic approach, it's hard to say that a surrealist like Ball is back on brand. That said, longtime readers will find thisBlack Mirror--flavored episode closer toThe Divers' Game (2019) orA Cure for Suicide (2015) than to his more conventional deliveries. Our point of entry into this peculiar world is Abel Cotter, a 40-something sanitation worker--he prefers "heavy-machine operator"--and a complete cipher despite a tragic backstory. Abel has been selected to serve on the jury of a futuristic justice system meant to focus on forward progress rather than corporal punishment, the ultimate goal being to eliminate "unfit" individuals from society. Its execution depends on the titular device, a cryptic machine that enables the juror to experience the accused's life firsthand, down to feelings, motivations, and regrets. Unlike a typical jury, this one is narrowed by process of elimination, a process starkly explained to Abel with warnings like, "You may be a coward. This has been taken into account," and "This is not your regular life. Have a care." Our glimpses of Abel's experience evoke the TV seriesThe Prisoner and the invasive justice parlayed in Philip K. Dick'sThe Minority Report. Just when you think you've figured things out, Ball changes tempo midstream when we meet the accused. In the second half of the book, the unnamed defendant narrates his surreal, taboo relationship with his sister, set against the backdrop of an abusive household and culminating in her death. Ball puts down broad brush strokes here about bureaucratic justice versus human frailty, but the devil is in the details; his disorienting style and the unsettling atmosphere deliver a uniquely uncomfortable experience. A provocative vision of a world desperately in search of basic human compassion. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
