82 – Mike Meginnis and Things You Should Do Before You Die

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Are you ready for another apocalypse? Covid and nukes not enough for ya? 

Well here you go then. Something slightly different.  

Mike Meginnis’ Drowning Practice is an odder than usual end-of-days. It’s a book in which everyone knows that time is up, and yet they just don’t seem to care. There are few (I won’t say zero) ravening lunatics in this book – but the more chilling realisation is that even at the end of the world, you still have to go to work.

Mike and I talk about art and NFT monkeys, about poisoned capitalism and how his book mirrors our own pre-apocalyptic malaise. We also talk about the link between depression and creativity, and we have a friendly disagreement about whether the protagonist of this book is a deeply sinister character.

This is a gentler end-of-days than most, but no less horrifying in its implications.

Enjoy!

Drowning Practice is published March 15th by Ecco Books. 

Other books mentioned in this conversation include:

• The Men (2022), by Sandra Newman
• Never Let Me Go (2005), by Kazuo Ishiguro
• Lunar Park (2005), by Bret Easton Ellis

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