H2O [Paperback]

Mark Swartz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2006

It's 2020 and the world is facing an unthinkable crisis: shortages and contamination have made drinking water scarce. Hayden Shivers is a lowly filter and drains engineer employed by Drixa, a mega-corporation with a monopoly on water. When he stumbles upon a method for synthesizing fake water, Hayden is promised a big promotion if he signs over his patent to Drixa. As the company hustles to get the product on the market, Hayden frantically tries to stop them until the new water is confirmed safe. The situation grows increasingly dire as advice pours in from all fields: a fanatically loyal manager, a cynical divorce lawyer, a muckraking reporter, and his brilliant mail-order “maid.” Told in a brilliantly off-kilter style that reverberates with the sublime and the paradoxical, H2O traces and retraces the overlapping family and corporate intrigues that threaten to turn a life-saving invention into an instrument of disaster.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Swartz portrayed a dangerously alienated loner brooding in Chicago's central library in Instant Karma (2002). Here he zaps forward in time to depict Chicago as a chaotic city-state with a burgeoning homeless population and a failing infrastructure. Tap water is but a cherished memory, so toxic is Lake Michigan. In fact, the earth's entire freshwater supply is imperiled, which is good for the mega corporation Drixa, which is gearing up to produce synthetic water. Or is the fake water fake? Hayden Shivers, a hapless filter and drain engineer who discovered the water-making properties of a rare fungus off the coast of Malta, can't figure out if he is about to be promoted, fired, or worse. Is the African mail-order maid who destroyed his marriage actually an undercover operative? What's up with the beautiful environmental rights protestor, Aqua Bella? Swartz's shrewd, jittery, and noirishly atmospheric speculative tale about a bumbling antihero and dire environmental trauma brings an irreverent and parrying voice to ecofiction and casts a fractured light on follies petty and catastrophic. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Paperback: 166 pages
• Publisher: Soft Skull Press (October 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1933368195
• ISBN-13: 978-1933368191
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,429,232 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Drink Up!, November 30, 2006

By 

JuJu (Boulder, CO) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: H2O (Paperback)

I suggest reading this book in a hot bath with a nice cold glass of filtered water beside you. Or in the desert of your choice. In a time when everything we take for granted can be bought and sold, a funny edgy noir novel that attacks the commodification of life, and most essentially, water, is just what what the doctor ordered. But be careful; before you take a sip, you may want to determine-- does H20 = water? I have my doubts. Nothing is quite as it seems, but how can you resist a novel that begins with a hotel lobby smelling of "spent fireworks," and later goes on to discuss the relative merits of the competing disciplines of Nearmissology and Closecallology. No doubt there are pages to be written the relationship of the Maltese Fungus to the Maltese Falcon, but in the meantime you can just enjoy the laboratory notes which include "Nuking the fungus," and "Some puzzles have no answers. You actually want to bite your own head."

To paraphrase the Canadian poet, Nicole Brossard, two things we are running out of are water and silence. Perhaps some day Swarz will tackle silence for us as well.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Um, eh?, June 9, 2009

By 

Justine B. (Brooklyn!) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: H2O (Paperback)

This was chosen for my bookclub a while back. Wouldn't call it bad, but certainly wouldn't call it mind-shattering. And, like most scifi with great premises but poor execution, it dribbles off into a rather uninspired ending. But it's short, so hey, why not give a small-press author a shot?

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Leaves you thirsty for more works from this brilliant new voice!, November 9, 2006

By 

StingRaySam - See all my reviews

This review is from: H2O (Paperback)

Set in a future Chicago where the world's supply of potable water has dried up and one man has developed a water-like substitute that may or may not be the answer to the world's water crisis. The story follows the creepy Hayden Shivers, inventor and ex-husband, as he decides whether to hand over his slippery invention to his employer, mega-corporation Drixa, whose souless and seductive HR rep seems bent on getting the goods.

Read it. It's good.