Book Review: 'The Intuitionist' is a truly elevating read

Pulitzer prizewinner Colson Whitehead's 1999 debut novel The Intuitionist should change the way you regard lifts forever.

Set in an alternative film noir city, an unnamed New York full of incredibly tall buildings, cigarette girls and fedoras, this wonderfully weird story is both an investigation and a racial allegory.

At its heart is Lila Mae Watson, the second "coloured" and first woman to work for the Department of Elevator Inspectors. It is a respected job with "undeniable macho cachet". Lila Mae is also the first black female to graduate from the prestigious Institute for Vertical Transport, where she was influenced by Theoretical Elevators, a controversial work by Short Range Vertical Transport legend James Fulton.

Lila Mae is an Intuitionist, someone who feels, observes and intuits the state of a lift - rather than the more traditional and mainstream Empiricist, who uses an instrument to inspect it. Studies indicate Intuitionists may be more accurate and, indeed, might take over the powerful Elevator Inspectors' Guild.

That is, until a lift Lila Mae inspected goes into freefall. No one is hurt, but serious doubt is cast over the validity of the Intuitionist methodology. Unwilling to be a political pawn or to be used as a scapegoat by the Empiricist lobby, she conducts her own investigation.

Rating: 4/5 stars

• 'The Intuitionist' by Colson Whitehead is published by Fleet in 2017. It was first published in 1999.

• This article was originally published in The Times.