Sri Lankan author Yudhanjaya Wijeratne will deal with a surreal landscape where technology and humanity intersect as he pens a trilogy on the “Commonwealth Empire”, with the first volume of the speculative fiction series to hit book stores in November.
The “Commonwealth Empire” trilogy will be published by HarperCollins India, which has also acquired Yudhanjaya’s award-winning science-fiction work “Numbercaste”.
“The Inhuman Race”, the first part of trilogy, will be published in November along with “Numbercaste”. “The Inhuman Race” is about what it means to be human, and how the gears of history come to haunt us even as we race into the future.
“Science fiction and fantasy are still very thin on the ground in these parts of the world, and I’m glad that Harper’s decided to offer me a much longer-term working relationship than we usually expect from publishers,” said Wijeratne.
Diya Kar, Publisher (Fiction) at HarperCollins India, described Wijeratne as one of the most original and having extraordinary power of imagination.
“We are constantly looking for new, exciting voices from the subcontinent. We are thrilled that Wijeratne has chosen to publish with us,” she said.
According to Commissioning Editor Swati Daftuar, Wijeratne’s writing is taut and his plotting fantastic.
“This is speculative fiction at its best - gripping, beautifully intricate, and so very relevant today,” she said.
“The year is 2033. The British Empire never fell. Communism never happened. The Commonwealth flies the flag of the Empire. Many of the Empire’s colonies are stripped bare in the name of British interests, powerless to resist. To the Far East, the Second Song Emperor rules China, and meditates upon an electronic empire built behind the Bamboo Curtain.
“Upon this stage is Ceylon: a once-proud civilization tracing itself back to the time of the Pharaohs, reduced but not dead: for the Great Houses of Kandy still control the most lucrative trade routes; and even dust and ashes can serve a purpose,” according to the book’s blurb.
Source: PTI
