It looks like J.G. Ballard’s Millennium People suffers in comparison to its thematically linked predecessors, Cocaine Nights and Super-Cannes, let alone the seminal Crash.

On reading Millennium People, the Herald’s Stephen Jewell says, "Unfortunately, Ballard's middle-class-revolution concept often verges on the wrong side of parody." (It’s an opinion also expressed by the leading UK critic, Adam Mars-Jones.) But Jewell feels that even when Ballard is off-form, he is still better than most: "But while Millennium People is a gentler trip into Ballardland, it is still a literary excursion worth taking."

On the subject of strong themes, it looks like younger readers will relish Bernard Beckett’s Home Boys. According to Margie Thomson:

The story - of abuse, escape, belonging and betrayal amid dour, isolated little communities where all manner of frightening behaviour can be got away with - clips along with great energy. I still think Jolt is the most coherent of Beckett's recent novels, but this one is a grim, glorious extravagance. Its great dollops of adventure and emotional complexity should please a wide audience.