Better known as John Christopher, author of The Death of Grass and The Tripods tetralogy, Sam Youd started his career writing straight (aka ‘literary’) fiction, very different in tone from the dystopian and genre novels which made his name. This coming Sunday – April 16th – marks the 101st anniversary of his birth. In celebration, The SYLE Press will make available for free download, the Kindle version of his 1951 novel Babel Itself:

London in the late forties: strange shifting times in the aftermath of the war. A motley sample of humanity has washed up on the shores of the down-at-heel boarding house that is 36 Regency Gardens, their mutual proximity enforced by shared impoverishment.

Gentleman publisher Tennyson Glebe, no longer young, watches with mild interest as fellow residents go through the motions of seeking redemption, through politics, through art, through religion; the inconsequentiality of his present existence throwing the past into vivid relief.

And whilst Helen, as landlady, presides over the breakfast table, it is the unnaturally large hands of the diminutive Piers Marchant, Tennyson comes to realise, that seek to control the marionettes’ strings – his own included.

Who was it, after all, who had decided that a séance or two might assuage the evening boredom before the nightly trip to the pub?

Babel Itself is free on Kindle from 15th till 17th April. Note: Amazon begins its promotions from midnight Pacific Standard Time!