“The Possibility of an Island” is a new novel from the author of the world bestsellers “Elementary Particles” and “Platform”. This book is, first of all, about love. Houellebecq himself, who received the Interallier Prize for it (2005), considers it the best of everything he has written. Having stated in one of his interviews that he is “not a storyteller,” Houellebecq nevertheless tells here, in his characteristic ironic manner, many non-trivial stories intertwined into a fascinating plot: about totalitarian sects, about show business and about the fate of distant descendants of humanity, onto which our current emotions and actions are projected. By establishing a kind of teleconference between the past and the future, Houellebecq overturns modern ideas about the structure of the world. The main character, a pop artist, first successfully performs with sketches of his own composition, then just as successfully makes porn films. Power over a rapidly growing audience prompts him to analyze the state of minds and embark on risky experiments. From these experiments the second plan of the book grows - fantastic, surprisingly harmoniously fused with the harsh realism of the first.