Monday 31 August 2009

We wait in the shadows


I'm at work today, despite the bank holiday, and at 8am this morning, the streets of east London were deserted. Really, eerily, did-I-miss-the-zombie-apocalypse deserted.

I think my sensitivity to the empty streets and lack of traffic might have something to do with one of the books I read this weekend - Stephen Baxter's Flood, in which the world ends, starting in London. Well, starting in London from the perspective of the characters in the book, at least. The descriptions of the the early floods in central London are really vivid, which I'm sure I'll remember them next time I walk down the Embankment at high tide, plus now I'll have something to think about whenever I'm stuck on the Dartford Crossing bridge looking over at Lakeside! (glug, glug, glug)

It's not Romanitas or Neverwhere, which are two of my favourite alternative Londons, but it certainly lingered in my mind this morning!

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