The Chimes
core novel 2015 The Chimes
Record
| First published | 2015 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.37 (3,118 ratings, collected 2026-09-15) |
| Page count | 291 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9781444794502 |
| Internal chronology | 1 |
Synopsis
The Chimes is set in a post-apocalyptic London reshaped by a catastrophic event known as the Allbreaking, in a society where written language has been abolished and replaced by song, and where an authoritarian order enforces a daily ritual of overwhelming bell chimes that erase people's long-term memories. The protagonist, Simon, arrives in London and falls in with a group of teens living underground and surviving through scavenging, led by Lucien, who is blind but possesses an unusually gifted memory for music that lets him retain what the chimes are meant to strip away. As Simon adjusts to this world and his place within Lucien's group, he begins to sense that the chimes, and the order that enforces them, are hiding something about the true history of the Allbreaking that the ruling powers do not want remembered.
Where it sits
- Universe: The Chimes
- Series: The Chimes core; position 1 of 1 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Anna Smaill
Awards (verified)
- World Fantasy Award (Best Novel), 2016: won
Notes
- From the series record (The Chimes): Standalone novel; a dystopian secondary world where written language is banned and memory is instead carried through music. Anna Smaill's first universe in this canon; her only other novel, Bird Life (2023), is an unrelated, separate standalone work.
Sources
- World Fantasy Awards -- Official Winners Archive
- https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/anna-smaill/the-chimes/
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