Black Glass, speculative fiction with a sentimental edge, explores a nation controlled by an intrusive surveillance culture and subliminal social engineering. Set in a dystopian future Melbourne where the formerly affluent inner-city Docklands district has become a ghetto of ‘vacant high-rise towers’ and marginalised ‘undocumented’ persons, Meg Mundell’s first novel outlines the climate in an opening epigraph: ‘There is no legal requirement to submit a full set of personal data to the National Documentation of Identity Database’, Article 18(b) advises, ‘[h]owever, any person whose full data set is not recorded in the Database and updated as stipulated may forfeit certain benefits, privileges and rights outlined in the relevant national and international laws.’