From the New York Times bestselling author of Days, Provender Gleed and the Pantheon series comes a darkly comic near-future satire about fate, fame, and reality TV.Luke Fallon and his twin brother Johnny are opposite sides of the same coin, the one a grafter with a sense of responsibility, the other a grifter selling contraband on the street. When Luke wins a coveted place on the insanely popular game show BetterLife, he agrees to take part only because it will save Johnny from the wrath of the gangster boss he has swindled.But BetterLife is a poisoned chalice, the prizes as lucrative as the games involved are dangerous. With every round of the competition Luke gets through, the stakes rise. So does the threat to Johnny, despite the presence of newly acquired personal bodyguard Augustine Trebuchet.In a world where luck has become a religion, both Luke and Johnny will discover that for every winner there has to be a loser and for every victory, a sacrifice.
Author Biography:
Biography in Brief James Lovegrove was born on Christmas Eve 1965 and is the author of more than 50 books. His novels include The Hope, Days, Untied Kingdom, Provender Gleed, the New York Times bestselling Pantheon series - so far The Age Of Ra, The Age Of Zeus, The Age Of Odin, Age Of Aztec, Age Of Voodoo and Age Of Shiva, plus a collection of three novellas, Age Of Godpunk - and Redlaw and Redlaw: Red Eye, the first two volumes in a trilogy about a policeman charged with protecting humans from vampires and vice versa. He has produced two Sherlock Holmes novels, The Stuff Of Nightmares and Gods Of War, with more on the way. His latest series is the Dev Harmer Missions, an outer-space action-adventure series, beginning with World Of Fire. James has sold well over 40 short stories, the majority of them gathered in two collections, Imagined Slights and Diversifications. He has written a four-volume fantasy saga for teenagers, The Clouded World (under the pseudonym Jay Amory), and has produced a dozen short books for readers with reading difficulties, including Wings, Kill Swap, Free Runner, Dead Brigade, and the 5 Lords Of Pain series. James has been shortlisted for numerous awards, including the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, the Bram Stoker Award, the British Fantasy Society Award and the Manchester Book Award. His short story "Carry The Moon In My Pocket" won the 2011 Seiun Award in Japan for Best Translated Short Story. James's work has been translated into twelve languages. His journalism has appeared in periodicals as diverse as Literary Review, Interzone and BBC MindGames, and he is a regular reviewer of fiction for the Financial Times and contributed features and reviews about comic books to the late, lamented Comic Heroes magazine. He lives with his wife, two sons and cat in Eastbourne, a town famously genteel and favoured by the elderly, but in spite of that he isn't planning to retire just yet.
