What would the world be like if men suddenly disappeared? That is the premise of Sandra Newman’s new sci-fi novel that asks how easily we can change history, says Sally Adee

Humans 29 June 2022

A kind of biblical rapture has excised all men from the world in The Men

Mads Perch/Getty Images

The Men

Sandra Newman

Granta

WE ARE hallucinating all the time, according to neuroscience research. Our brains constantly tease comprehensible patterns out of a million sensory inputs – from buzzing bees to approaching animals. This isn’t reality, but a good prediction of what reality should be, informed by past experience. While it is an efficient way for the brain to generate the feeling of consciousness, it also means we are like passengers facing backwards on …