DiscoverNPR's Book of the Day PlusIan McEwan’s latest novel ‘What We Can Know’ is science fiction without the science
Ian McEwan’s latest novel ‘What We Can Know’ is science fiction without the science

Ian McEwan’s latest novel ‘What We Can Know’ is science fiction without the science

Update: 2025-09-29
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At 77, the Booker Prize-winning British novelist Ian McEwan shows no signs of slowing down. His new novel, What We Can Know, is set in Great Britain in the 22nd century – a country now partly underwater as a result of global warming. In today’s episode, McEwan speaks with NPR’s Scott Simon about the book’s plot – it tells of a search for a lost poem that was written in our own times – and notes that he is less interested in the future of science than that of the humanities, love and daily life.


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Ian McEwan’s latest novel ‘What We Can Know’ is science fiction without the science

Ian McEwan’s latest novel ‘What We Can Know’ is science fiction without the science