The City & The City

| 4.01 | 50,773 ratings and reviews

Recommended by Bradley Voytek, and 1 others. See all reviews

Ranked #8 in Weird, Ranked #21 in Cities — see more rankings.

When a murdered woman is found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. But as he investigates, the evidence points to conspiracies far stranger and more deadly than anything he could have imagined.

Borlú must travel from the decaying Beszel to the only metropolis on Earth as strange as his own. This is a border crossing like no other, a journey as psychic as it is physical, a shift in perception, a seeing of the unseen. His destination is Beszel’s equal, rival, and intimate... more
Buy on Amazon

Reviews and Recommendations

We've comprehensively compiled reviews of The City & The City from the world's leading experts.

Bradley Voytek There’s a phrase I once heard, ‘every story has one buy.’ There’s one totally ridiculous thing that readers have to buy into. The author doesn’t usually get more than one buy, and their story and their world have to be internally consistent with that one ridiculous thing. In The City & the City there is a supernatural force that comes in and yanks people out of reality if they break the rules of the mutually agreed upon imperception of the overlapping cities. It’s completely ridiculous, but Miéville builds the entire world around it and it’s internally consistent. (Source)

Rankings by Category

The City & The City is ranked in the following categories:

Similar Books

If you like The City & The City, check out these similar top-rated books:

Learn: What makes Shortform summaries the best in the world?

Learn More