What would you do if your girlfriend woke up from a coma after 18 years and told you the world was about to end? For Richard and his friends, who have just spent 18 years being miserable, this is kind of hard to cope with. What is worse is that the prediction comes true, and the small band of friends could be the only ones who can save the planet. Only they haven't got a clue. In his latest novel, Girlfriend in a Coma, Canadian author Douglas Coupland continues on the path he started on with his debut Generation X. That was mainly concerned with the lives of thirty-somethings in the 90s, charting the emptiness of post-modern society. But even in Generation X, Coupland seemed to be looking for something to fill that emptiness. In his later novels, Shampoo Planet and Microserfs, his characters tried to fill the void with storytelling and pleasant work. In Life after God he came to the (surprising?) conclusion that what modern-day society might be missing is religion. Girlfriend in a Coma takes the search even further. And although he needs a ghost and an impossible time-leap to get his message across, he still manages to tell a convincing story, packed with his usual dose of humour. But unlike his fellow Generation X-er Brett Easton Ellis, Coupland is not content with merely describing the lives of today's young adults. Where Ellis limits himself to writing books about hollow people, who may be searching for something but never hard enough to find anything, Coupland finds the escape. Again, he has managed to write a gripping and enjoyable book which, after you've closed it, will give you plenty to think about.

Geert-Willem Overdijkink, The Netherlands

Girlfriend in a Coma is published by Regan Books, a division of HarperCollins New York. ISBN 0-06-039178-2