Jeanette Winterson’s Frankenstein for the Modern Age - Frankissstein

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was first published in January 1818 but over 100 years later this story of a doctor creating artificial intelligence still resonates with readers.

In May this year, Jonathan Cape, an imprint of Penguin Random House, is publishing an exciting new re-write of Shelley’s gothic tale. Written by Jeanette Winterson, of Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit fame, the new book is titled Frankissstein. A love story set in a Brexit Britain, Frankissstein features a young transgender doctor called Ry who is falling in love with Victor Stein, a professor leading the debate surrounding artificial intelligence (AI).

Meanwhile, Ron Lord, fresh from a divorce has moved back in with his mother, setting into motion his plans to make his fortune by creating a new generation of sex-dolls targeted at lonely women across the world. At the same time, in Phoenix, Arizona, a facility houses bodies of medically and legally dead men and women in cryogenics, waiting for the day they are returned to life.

In this new take on Shelley’s classic, Winterson explores the ever-nearing line between human and the new artificial intelligence, gaining speed to outrank us as the smartest being on planet earth. Are we closer to this future than we think?

Find out soon in Winterson’s Frankissstein, which will be released on 23^rd May 2019 and is available to pre-order now!