Alteration - Amis, Kingsley

Of all the choristers at the Cathedral Basilica of St George, he is the angel - the one whose voice could only have been made in heaven. In every other respect Hubert is utterly ordinary: a nice, rather timid ten-year-old boy. The year is 1976, but by bold Amisian sleight-of-hand, the England of The Alteration has become a disconcerting, quasi-medieval land in the Age of Faith. And here a wickedly brilliant Swiftian satire takes shape. It's modest proposal? Well, it stands to reason that Hubert's glorious voice must be preserved at all costs. So castration is clearly the only answer.