This is a novel of madness, of the creeping and ultimately
irreversible inability to distinguish between the real and the
imaginary. What is certain about it is its style, a measured, cadenced,
in some ways restrained, but always lyrical prose that at times borders
on the poetic but is never less than a joy to read, not least because
each word is so well chosen that one can see immediately in one's mind
exactly what is being described. Images fairly leap from the page.
The Affirmation is without doubt Priest's finest work
to date, a brilliant and sustained novel of imaginative power. I have no
hesitation whatsoever in commending it to you as one of the best sf
novels I have read and, indeed, as one of the best novels of the year.