A History Maker
Alasdair Gray
 Like Gray's Poor Things the novel takes the form of documentation written by the characters themselves in order to record their experiences for posterity: a Prologue and notes (which make up almost a third of the total text) by "the hero's mother", and the central portion of the book, which is a third person narrative written by its protagonist, Wat Dryhope. Wat finds himself dissatisfied with the lack of purpose in a life in which everything is provided by powerplants, bypassing any need for manual labour. He develops an unhealthy interest in the ancient history of twentieth-century wars and dictatorships when men's struggles had a purpose, leaving himself vulnerable to exploitation to a plot to destroy his world's way of life.