The Flame Alphabet

The Flame Alphabet

By Ben Marcus

First published in Great Britain in 2012.

This is a brilliant book, but takes some persistence to read and appreciate the message.  I’d leave it at that but I can imagine the comments you’d leave, so here are a few paragraphs of me trying to tempt you to read this book.

The Flame Alphabet tells the story of a terrible epidemic that makes the speech of children toxic to adults.  Sam and his wife Claire have to decide whether to stay with their teenage daughter and waste away, or escape to the quarantine centre.  The story follows their journey into the unknown and the people they meet, including a strange scientist named Le Bov who seems to be trying to create a cure.  Sam soon becomes involved in attempts to make a new alphabet which does not infect adults, as even reading letters kill people.

I bought this book because the idea of language making people ill intrigued me.  I could not imagine a world where any sort of human interaction, through speech, facial expression or reading was fatal.  As I read the book it raised more questions than gave answers, and really made me think about what would happen if speech were dangerous.  At one point Sam wonders what the point is of having an idea if you cannot share it with someone and this really stuck with me.

Character wise, I didn’t feel anybody was particularly developed.  I was interested in Sam’s situation but did not feel much emotion towards him.  For me, the book’s emotion was brought about by the plot rather than the characters.  Saying that, Le Bov did make me quite uncomfortable as he is an untrustworthy oddball who has a worrying power over people.  To me he represented corporations who would take advantage of the public’s desperation in a terrifying situation.

 As a dystopian novel it was not one I felt as attached to as others, for example The Handmaid’s Tale, as it did not seem as plausible, but it was a truly interesting idea.  The story is slow at times and meanders along, however I thought that in the context of the toxic speech killing slowly it works.  

I would say you need some patience when reading this one, and I definitely didn’t take in all the layers of meaning on the first go, but stick with it and it will make you appreciate language and speech in new ways.