Science Fiction Reading Group: The City of Endless Night

Just as the evenings start to get a little lighter we’re setting out to read a very dark book. The City of Endless Night is a novel firmly placed in the dystopian tradition, predating both Brave New World and 1984. It’s 2151 and American scientist Lyman de Forrest finds himself in Berlin, an underground city where such concepts as freedom and family are things of the past. Written towards the end of the First World War, City of Endless Night is a work of frightening prescience and, interestingly enough, is often thought to be one of the main influences behind Fritz Lang’s masterpiece, Metropolis.