The Drowned World

First published in 1962, this novel is set in a flooded, tropical London after solar radiation has melted the ice caps. Lagoons cover the city; giant reptiles and insects move through drowned buildings. Dr. Robert Kerans, a biologist attached to a military survey under Colonel Riggs, feels a pull toward heat, dreams, and inactivity as the climate reverts. Beatrice Dahl remains in a penthouse. The pirate-like Strangman arrives to loot the receding waters. The book is a science-fiction study of psychological regression in a changed climate, not a treatise on global warming.

Bound in blue buckram cover blocked with a design in gilt and brown by James Boswell. Dark grey slipcase. Gold endpapers.