Just look at Simon Stålenhag’s work. It’s beautiful.

Tales from the Loop and Things from the Flood are difficult to describe – you have to experience them.

Thank you so much @humajehan for these amazing books 🤗

Stories drawn (I assume) from lived experience and rolled around in a vivid imagination are threaded through painted imagery that is at once immersive, weird and convincing.

Several times I found myself looking for clues about which elements may have been based on fact, and which were pure creative genius. A particle accelerator under Sweden? Well, there’s the Cyclotron in the Svedberg laboratory apparently, which fits the timeframe.

Searches around some of the other names and places from these stories turn up some interesting results, leaning more towards the fiction than the fact though I suspect. No, I haven’t explored everything.

Sure, there are obviously fantastical elements, but the narrative and (again, I am assuming) blended realism really do make you wonder how much of it is rooted reality.

Actually, I wish more of it was an account of realised engineering – it’d be a strange (even given the current level of strange) world if that were true. Except for the deviant biological components from 51 Pegasi B. I’d be less enthusiastic about those.

If you have access to Prime Video, take a look at Tales From The Loop there. I’m hoping Things From The Flood comes along there soon (there’s already a sticker on the front cover!).

Of course you can go straight to the source, too to get a look at the fine pictures.

The art, as engaging as it is by itself, made more sense to me when considered alongside the narrative, so do try to get the books if you can.

I hope you like them as much as I do!