The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi 

(Orbit, £7.99, out now)

Bio-punk is an emergent subgenre in sci-fi, swapping the cyber in cyberpunk for genetics. Debut author Bacigalupi does a fantastic job of world building here, as well as bringing to life a set of very real, and flawed, characters all trying to survive in a scary all-too-possible future.

Set in 23rd Century Thailand, the world at large is suffering from environmental collapse. It is a post-oil world threatened by risen sea levels, global agriculture blighted by genetically engineered diseases and man-made animals that have upended the natural ecosystem. However mankind survives and amidst this contorted world, merchants trade, politicians still fight and corruption is a lynchpin to society.

The Western Calorie companies are hated in Thailand and the protagonist Anderson Lake is an undercover company man, secretly scouting the Thai Kingdom for the origins of their recent blight-resistant foodstuffs. He meets and falls for a ‘windup girl’, a bioengineered human called Emiko, who was once a geisha/secretary from Japan, who now barely survives in a horrific Thai brothel.

Telling you that this is a Hugo and Nebula award-winning book does not do justice to the imagination contained within its covers. The alternating narrative gives you a broad but not distracting picture of the world whilst flashes of noir style and flurries of violence make it a great and gripping read. The science provides a thought provoking and compelling background to a tale of human survival and the struggle to prosper when all is falling apart around you.

A heart-stopping dystopian thriller and a reason alone to think long and hard about GM food.

Paul Eckersley, Designer, Black & White Publishing