These are times when alienation is reborn with greater vigor than ever. If in its origins alienation was considered a consequence of the chain work typical of the Industrial Revolution, today alienation has gained in sophistication and appears after newspeak, post-truth and the unsuccessful institutionalization of social conflict.
It is necessary to have very strong handles in other personal aspects so as not to end up succumbing to the alienation of the XNUMXst century as a kind of Artificial Intelligence (perhaps the Markets and their macroeconomics) that governs us all by inserting slogans of supposed happiness among the contempt for reality and its most annoying truth.
That's why it never hurts to indulge in reading a novel like this. The truth is that the author Philippe Claudel has always stood out for his committed, critical narrative, but also with a very clear focus, precisely that of the alienation of the individual in our society.
With all this background you can already imagine a little (or a lot) of what you are going to find. You just need to know the tone, the specific plot and the style.
And the truth is that nothing will disappoint you. With the style of a crime novel and an absolutely empathetic tone, this novel manages, in the least of cases, to disconcert.
The plot and its resolution is certainly fascinating in its eerie simplicity, with a sense of alienation that seems to run through your skin.
It is a large company in which the suicide rate is very high. An external investigator is sent to look for the causes. And yes, it seems that the environment is not the most suitable to perform any task in that large company.
So much so that, at times, you think that suicides are a kind of covert murder, a kind of seizure of the will towards doom.
At times disconcerting, always sinister ..., a sense of latent unease guides you through the novel, with that heartburn that sometimes produces the consciousness of the ominous peering into reality beyond the book.
Those most interested in allowing alienation to roam freely between doses of social soma (see Huxley), they are the ones who advocate creating a better world, a better civilization, a better workplace ...
You can now buy the novel Explore out of the comfort zone, the new book by Philippe Claudel, here: