After Us The Penguins

English sample translation by Sophie Schlondorff available

A look at the apocalypse from its funny side: a wonderfully ironic and tongue-in-cheek crime novel set among a peculiar breed of people made only slightly more peculiar by the fact that they are basically all that is left of humanity.

Humanity has all but done away with itself – one nuclear bomb too many and all that is left are a few people on the remote Falkland Islands and maybe a few others scattered here and there. But although the end of the world has come, the inhabitants of the Falklands avoid talking about this unpleasantness, in truly British fashion, and carry on regardless.

And actually, the cozy life in this British enclave has barely changed: People still go to the pub, shear sheep and enjoy the fine sea air. OK, yes: the absence of children is a bit strange. And the fact that you have to venture on dangerous expeditions to the Argentine mainland for fuel and other supplies is also quite a bore. But what really gets to them is when the universally popular governor is struck dead with a bust of Churchill – in a room whose doors and windows were locked from the inside. Now everything begins to falls apart. Who would want to do such a terrible thing? Do the inhabitants of the stranded cruise liner anchoring off the coast have anything to do with it? They, after all, would like to do away with the monarchy and install a democratic government. Joshua Feldenkrais, host of the island radio and a gay Mormon American with Jewish roots who left the cruise liner to live and work on the Falklands, investigates – and finds himself drawn ever deeper into a whirlpool of conspiracies, sinister intrigues and penguins…