Freezing Point

In this sly and visionary 1969 novel from Bodelsen (Think of a Number), reissued with a new introduction by Sophie Mackintosh, a 30-something magazine editor agrees to be cryogenically frozen until a cure is found for his terminal cancer. As Mackintosh points out, Bodelsen’s book was published in a world abuzz with the possibilities of cryonics. His everyman protagonist, however, is skeptical of the experimental procedure, in part because he isn’t sure whether he has reason to live. A lonely man, Bruno fills his time ginning up ideas for his magazine’s contributors and doubts his own ability to become a writer. But after falling in love with ballet dancer Jenny, he’s filled with enough zest for life to undergo the procedure. He wakes up in 1995, in a bifurcated world where a shrinking “now-life” class of people live off payments for serving as organ donors to the “all-life” class, who are so busy working to finance their transplants that Bruno worries people will stop reading literature. As Bruno schemes to reunite with Jenny, Bodelsen offers striking existential reflections on mortality and witty insights into the social cost of eternal life. It’s a revelatory thought experiment. (Mar.)