#106. THE CONTINUOUS KATHERINE MORTENHOE By D G Compton

Published : 1974
Pages : 239
Overall Mark : 7/10

A few years in the future, medical science has advanced to the point where it is practically unheard of for people to die of any cause except old age. The few exceptions provide the fodder for a new kind of television show for avid audiences who lap up the experience of watching someone else’s dying weeks. So when Katherine Mortenhoe is told she has about four weeks to live she knows it’s not just her life she’s about to lose, but her privacy as well.

D G COMPTON (1930-)
David Guy Compton was born in London in 1930. He is a British science fiction author who publishes SF under the name D G Compton. His earlier crime novels were published under ‘Guy Compton’, and his Gothic novels under ‘Frances Lynch’. He is best known for The Continuous Katherine Mortenhoe, a classic of British SF that exposed the pitfalls of voyeuristic entertainment decades before the likes of ‘The Truman Show’.

VERDICT
This is an interesting look at how society has sadly become over the years, with a true fascination with celebrity and the unusual, a concept which has been used in such movies as The Truman Show and edTV. With this novels focus on a world where death is not common place, the illness of a seemingly ordinary member of society can quickly turn their lives into a living hell. The fact that the woman in this book may not in fact have the illness she has been told she has just adds to the overall pathos of the piece.