Station Zero

Thunder City has been out in the world for a week now. Here's a nice review by Sam Creighton .  And here's another from Through the Bookshelf .  If you've read the book and like it, please do add a review on Amazon or whichever social media site you prefer. (If you've read the book and didn't like it, please don't!) Meanwhile, I've been on the Adventuremice trail with Sarah McIntyre, who has blogged about our adventures in Marlborough and Bath . 

For obvious reasons I approve of both stories about imaginary cities and old men blowing their savings on self-funded movies , so I felt obliged to go and see Francis Ford Coppola's Megalopolis despite the decidedly patchy reviews. And much to my surprise, I thoroughly enjoyed it!  It's a very odd film: a sort of allegorical drama set in 'New Rome', which looks like New York, but where people wear slightly Roman-inflected costumes and have names like Crassus, Cicero and Ce(a)sar. The idea that the United States = Rome is an old one, but I'm not sure it's ever been done quite this literally: there are chariot races in Madison Square Garden. But the story isn't an updating of any particular episode from Roman history. It's about a genius architect 'Cesar Catilina', played by Adam Driver, whose vision of a utopian new city built from his wonder-material 'Megalon' is frustrated by the cautious mayor, Frank Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito). All t