The Electric State

• NOW A MAJOR NETFLIX FILM DIRECTED BY THE RUSSO BROTHERS, STARRING MILLIE BOBBIE BROWN, CHRIS PRATT AND KE HUY QUAN **

A teenage girl and her robot embark on a cross-country road trip in this beautifully illustrated science fiction story, perfect for fans of Fallout and Black Mirror.   In late 1997, a runaway teenager and her small yellow toy robot travel west through a strange American landscape where the ruins of gigantic battle drones litter the countryside, along with the discarded trash of a high-tech consumerist society addicted to a virtual-reality system. As they approach the edge of the continent, the world outside the car window seems to unravel at an ever faster pace, as if somewhere beyond the horizon, the hollow core of civilization has finally caved in.

Told in achingly melancholy, spare prose and featuring almost a hundred gorgeous, full-colour illustrations, The Electric State is a novel like no other.   PRAISE FOR THE ELECTRIC STATE: “A jaw-dropping science fiction artbook . . . This quiet, sad adventure is an excellent and visually stunning addition to any graphic novel, art, or science fiction collection.” Publishers Weekly “A haunting illustrated novel. . . . Readers of bleak, emotionally rich dystopian science fiction will be fascinated with the way Stålenhag doles out details.” Booklist (starred) “The Electric State is a striking and strangely compelling work of science fiction gothic.“New York Journal of Books “One part art-book, one part picture-book—the mundanity of everyday relationships play out alongside science fiction imagery that is as beautiful as it is unsettling.” Waypoint “Simon Stålenhag’s stories crawl into my brain and mess with my memory of history, time, and place.” NPR Books “The mix of science fiction and real world pop-culture nostalgia is instantly compelling, but there are layers to The Electric State that take the story beyond surface value.” Los Angeles Times

Author Biography

Simon Stålenhag (b. 1984) is the internationally acclaimed author, concept designer and artist behind Tales from the Loop and Things from the Flood. His highly imaginative images and stories depicting illusive sci-fi phenomena in mundane, hyper-realistic Scandinavian and American landscapes have made Stålenhag one of the most sought-after visual storytellers in the world. Tales from the Loop was ranked one of the “10 Best Dystopias” by The Guardian, along with such works as Franz Kafka’s The Trial and Andrew Niccol’s Gattaca.