The Day of Creation Author:J. G. Ballard At Port-la-Nouvelle, on the parched terrain of central Africa, Dr. Mallory watches as his clinic fails and dreams of discovering a third Nile that will make the Sahara bloom. When there is a trickle on the local airstrip, and soon a river, the obsessed Mallory claims it as his own creation. Joined by Noon, a silent adolescent girl who as a child... more » ran with the local guerrillas; Professor Sanger, a documentary filmmaker with a fading reputation; and Nora Warrender, the widow of a Rhodesian veterinary surgeon, the remains of whose menagerie flourish exotically amid the land's new fertility, Mallory sets out for the river's source. The Day of Creation is a metaphysical adventure story dealing with complex themes -- the life-giving qualities of water, the cold eye of television, obsession, love -- all set in a dream Africa, as if hallucinated by Joseph Conrad. --Angela Carter« less