Divided Kingdom

I found mild similarities between Rupert Thomson's Divided Kingdom and some of Jose Saramago's dystopian novels. But whereas Saramago's Blindness is a supreme literary and sociological masterpiece (it, alone, is justification enough for his Nobel Prize), Thomson's novel never makes it past the amusing and entertaining mark. Some of the considerations and situations are excellent but the ending is pretty disappointing.

All in all, I guess it's worth the read if you're into dystopian novels.

Synopsis

One night a boy who comes to be called Thomas Perry is taken from his family, caught up in a comprehensive unraveling of what had been a united kingdom. The powers that be—reacting to their country’s inexorable decline into consumerism, turpitude, racism, and violence—establish in its place four independent republics based on the perceived nature of the citizens assigned to each, and reinforce these new partitions with concrete barricades and razor wire. Renamed, relocated, and granted favored status, Thomas enjoys one success after another until, as a devoted civil servant, he suddenly falls out of the system entirely and travels illegally throughout a realm now utterly divided, his life in constant jeopardy. And by witnessing the best and worst and strangest of what society and human nature can offer, he begins to understand how little he knows of his true self or the desires and needs that define satisfaction and happiness for everyone.