Ashley Garner

I picked this up from the library because I loved “Not that kind of mother,” another book by the same author. This wasn’t as good but I did not find it as terrible as many others, apparently. The writing style is fitting for a work of literary fiction. If the characters are unlikeable, then they are unlikeable in the way I imagine we all would be if our inner dialogue was accessible to others, especially our inner dialogue in the middle of an incomprehensible crisis. Perhaps I’m being too generous, but the vague ending also seemed purposefully unsatisfying. It’s clear from descriptions throughout the text that the characters are facing some apocalyptic event in the wake of their society’s collective inaction on climate change. I thought Alam was making a point: the world that these (fictional—an important aside for folks who were so skeeved out by descriptions of not real kids) characters inhabit had been unfazed at the incremental fall of their society due to climate change that by the time they heard “the noise,” what difference do the details make—they face the amalgamation of all they had ignored or chose to accept as inevitable. Still, his other book is better! Maybe start there then you can read this one with affinity and generosity for the writer like I did lol!