Houellebecq is a brilliant writer attuned to our moment in time. His voice is always entrancingly pessimistic, almost without hope.

Set in a France of the near future, Submission captures the despairing slide of Western Civilisation away from our cultural inheritance and into a divided, violent, and uncaring future.

It is set in a time of the rise to political power of a predominantly Islamic political movement. A story of a great civilisation sleep walking into a future that no one asked for or wants.

As the incoming Islamic tide starts to penetrate more and more daily life, a Jewish lover leaves for Israel.

This is when he suddenly realises that this (France) is his homeland, and he has no Israel to run to.

A beautifully dismal book.