The great Australian doyen of stoners and share-house dwellers once again demonstrates his literary versatility, in this unlikely marriage of speculative fiction and airport novel. On the eve of America’s invasion of Iraq, a mysterious wave of energy ‘disappears’ the inhabitants of most of the continental United States. A Seattle city engineer, a CIA assassin and an Australian smuggler try and make sense of the phenomenon, while avoiding the opportunistic wrath of Saddam, Hugo Chavez, and the French secret service.

Fast-paced and clever, Without Warning is Birmingham at his best. His academic love of international relations provides a backdrop which is more insightful and rich than we’ve come to expect from most factual accounts of the prelude to the Iraq War. His attention to detail is unparalleled, whether describing the streets of Paris in lurid detail or gun battles in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. As always, Birmingham’s unique turns of phrase and his incorporation of real people into the narrative keep it all pumping along. Fans of his Axis of Time trilogy won’t be disappointed.