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The purveyor of such warm “family values” is a self-loathing comedian named Daniel. Like his creator, he is a Class A misanthrope. He has made a fortune out of scathing comedy (not surprisingly, Daniel takes many potshots at Muslim extremists — and Houellebecq has great fun with many “infra”-digs at the French media). Along with vast amounts of money comes a sort of love in the shape of Isabelle.

But an ever purer liaison affectif is established between Daniel and his dog, Fox, especially as Isabelle runs to fat, the marriage collapses, she kills herself and Daniel gets involved in a weird cult.

Meanwhile, modern life is disintegrating. But thanks to that new bio-techonological wonder called cloning, immortal life can be achieved. We discover that the text we are reading, the story of Daniel 1, is being simultaneously read by his 24th clone, 2,000 years in the future. (For animal lovers, the good news is that Daniel 1’s dog also gets cloned.)

Houellebecq is speed-juggling many ideas here. His novel is part-science fiction coupled with a scabrous commentary on the impossibility of achieving personal intimacy with someone else. We are fed gloomy predictions on the collapse of human existence as we know it. Along the way, there is the usual Houellebecquian cocktail of dehumanised sex, his obsession with beach resorts (a prominent feature of an earlier novel, Platform, which many angry readers regarded as a defence of sex tourism) and a bizarre romantic belief (considering his sardonicism) that love is the unattainable holy grail toward which we all strive.

In many ways, the plot of The Possibility of an Island is ridiculous. It is also a devoid of any emotional purchase; any sense of involvement with the characters.

But you don’t read Houellebecq for his narrative skills or for the subtle shading of his characters. You read him for his caustic world view, his delight in speaking the unspeakable. All such attributes are on show here. So is a genuine horror at the dismal way that life is lived now. Whether or not you find his stance bracing and necessary, or gratuitously offensive, there is no doubt that he is a writer who deserves the serious attention that he is now receiving.

Still, you come away from this novel thinking that he is basically pounding away at the same targets as in previous books. You find yourself enjoying the occasional nasty aside or the extended rant but little more. Houellebecq remains an interesting polemicist but diatribes do not a novel make.

Douglas Kennedy’s latest novel, State of the Union, is published by Hutchinson

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A talent to abuse

Houellebecq on:

Islam:
“It’s the stupidest religion in the world.”

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