Reviews

Reviews from Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com

Politics gone mad

By Paula Good 7 April 2015

What an enjoyable, intricate view of alternative politics, showing several sides of the same argument. It gave a balanced intelligent picture which was very thought-provoking, but added to that was an underlying tale of drama and intrigue which kept on building magnificently. Even the English grammar was good – what more can you ask?!

Believable, compelling political thriller

By “London Lass” 14 December 2014

Other countries – Cambodia, Nazi Germany, Stalin’s Russia – have used forced labour camps and genocide, but it couldn’t happen here, could it? Shades of Green envisages a sadly believable scenario where, actually, it does. A freak nuclear accident in France causes the Green Earth Movement to rise to power in the UK. GEM’s popularity dissipates as an economic recession and food shortages develop. Discarding their Lib Dem coalition partners, GEM maintains power with some sinister bedfellows – and then, the future begins to look very much darker. Britain’s only hope is its Green King and the US cavalry…

Horribly believable and absolutely compelling, Shades of Green is one of my favourite reads of 2014.

Destined to be a Classic 

By Gail Harkins 3 Nov 2014

Shades of Green, by Andy Lake, is powerful, unsettling, chilling and enlightening. It is a compelling, page-turning read that kept me up late many evenings because I absolutely had to know what happened next.

The story begins just before a nuclear disaster in Europe unleashes a radioactive cloud that blows into Britain. In the spirit of never letting a good crisis go to waste, a minor Green party steps up to aid the populace. By the time Parliamentary elections come round, the environment is the leading issue in people’s minds, and the Greens form a coalition government. But, as the story points out, there are various shades of green, from a simple belief in doing things more efficiently and with fewer resources to Malthusians who actively seek to reduce the population of the UK and, ultimately, the planet.

Shades of Green takes the reader inside the workings of the new Green government where we witness the impassioned plans to save the planet and the continuous escalation of pressure on the populace. After all, each new plan is designed to save Mother Earth. As environmental extremists rise to prominence in the government many of those plans become increasingly secret, as re-education policies are enacted. I won’t reveal more of the plot, but will say that Lake understands the radical game plan and how it would be enacted.

Shades of Green is a truly outstanding book and has the potential to one-day rank among dystopian classics like Orwell’s 1984

So believable

by ‘Sharon’

People have a tendency to take things too far. This excellent and believable read shows just how easily that can happen. I was surprised that the author, Andy Lake, could so clearly give us both sides of the issue, give each character their own voice and ideology, and make us see how something similar is possible.

The Grass Isn’t Always Greener

by Arlene Lagos

This exceptional political thriller is filled with amazing characters, eye-opening ideology and thought-provoking beliefs. I thoroughly enjoyed looking at the chaos of the political machine from this perspective.

A Darker Shade of Green

by Martin Hopkins

Shades of Green takes us along on a Green Revolution in England. When the Green Earth Movement unexpectedly wins the elections and installs a new prime minister not all is as it seems. The new eco villages, the projects to dismantle the economy and rely on gardening and the local economy are not well received by everyone.

As the most extreme environmentalists and animalists take more and more power their Utopia becomes a Dystopia. Of course it’s hard for those living in the new reality to see it for what it is. After all this is England where this kind of thing doesn’t happen. The book carefully builds the step by step course from winning the elections to taking away the freedoms that we take for granted as the dark side of the new government is slowly revealed to the reader

Shades of Brilliance

by “Michael”

“Shades of Green is a fast paced political thriller centred around the accession to power of environmental political parties and movements. The book cleverly lays out the broad and complex range of issues and points of view that radiate from concerns to protect the environment from human exploitation. And the how, where and when these start to come into conflict with the population’s immediate and future needs and demands on the environment. As shared concerns to protect the environment start to fracture and extremists start to take control,protecting the environment starts to take precedence over protecting people with horrifying consequences.

The author manages to show, with frightening credibility, how good motives and intentions can so easily and imperceptibly slide into terrible ones before anyone,except a relatively helpless few, realises. This turns out to be a salutory tale of what can happen when ideals become unmoored from humanity.

I look foward to the day when this gripping read is adapted into a gripping movie.”

Many Darkening Greens. Will Other Political Colours Fight Back?

by Richard Bunning

“Shades of Green is certainly not similar to a similarly titled popular shade. This is a deep political thriller, set in a United Kingdom in which the political balance is gradually lost. In this story, danger comes from the left, from a sort of green quasi national-socialism that is allowed to run out of control. We see how an evil mind-set and then terrifying manipulation of a population can grow out of benign belief hijacked by extremists.
In this fascinating book we follow the growth of a strengthening political philosophy, the appearance of its disciples, the slow subversion of the middle-ground, and the eventually near surrender of control. There are shades of 1984 and shades of Nazism, of fascism, of Talibanism, of state controlled communism, of any self-righteous doctrine that strives to subvert and then dictate.
The growth of extreme out of simple truths, simple injustices, greed for power, these are the building blocks of totalitarianism that can appear out of any marginal corner of the political spectrum. We see the political play, in which no one resists forcefully enough until it is too late. You will recycle, first your waste, then your lifestyle, then yourself, as the shades of green grow darker.”