Book Review: THE LAST MIGRATION by Charlotte McConaghy

 

Title: THE LAST MIGRATION

Author:  Charlotte McConaghy 

Read: December 2020

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟

 

Book Description:

 

A dark past. An impossible journey. The will to survive.

How far you would you go for love? Franny Stone is determined to go to the end of the earth, following the last of the Arctic terns on what may be their final migration to Antarctica.

As animal populations plummet and commercial fishing faces prohibition, Franny talks her way onto one of the few remaining boats heading south. But as she and the eccentric crew travel further from shore and safety, the dark secrets of Franny’s life begin to unspool. A daughter’s yearning search for her mother. An impulsive, passionate marriage. A shocking crime. Haunted by love and violence, Franny must confront what she is really running towards – and from.

The Last Migration is a wild, gripping and deeply moving novel from a brilliant young writer. From the west coast of Ireland to Australia and remote Greenland, through crashing Atlantic swells to the bottom of the world, this is an ode to the wild places and creatures now threatened, and an epic story of the possibility of hope against all odds.

My musings:

“What are you reading?” My husband asked.

“Oh, it’s this fantastic story about climate change, and all the birds and wild animals have become extinct, and there is this one woman who wants to follow the last of the Arctic terns on their final migration to Greenland ...”

“Ewww, that sounds terribly sad and depressing!”

Sad, yes, heart-wrenching. Eye opening. Gut-punching. Haunting and thought provoking. And if you think it’s dystopian, then sadly we are on this very path of destruction of our beautiful planet, which also made it very relevant.

In Frannie, Charlotte McConaghy has created the perfect character for this type of story. Flawed, single-minded, deeply scarred and emotionally unstable, Frannie is not only following her dream of seeing her beloved birds’ last migration but is also outrunning her dark past. The multiple timelines worked well here to piece together various pieces of Frannie’s past to explain what motivates her on this final journey. Set against the stunning backdrop of Greenland and the wild Arctic waters, the story soon swept me along in its wake.

THE LAST MIGRATION is not a happy story, but it is a beautiful written and very poignant one. If you find dystopian a bit hard to swallow, you might enjoy a story that is closely linked to the trajectory we are finding ourselves on at the moment. It certainly gave me many unpleasant truths to reflect on, and for this I am grateful. But there was also great adventure and courage, and characters I deeply felt for. And when the final truth was finally revealed, I suddenly understood why Frannie felt so driven to self-destruction.

  

Summary:

In summary, THE LAST MIGRATION was a touching story about loss, grief and survival in a world that is not so very removed from our own. It’s terrifying in a way that only a dystopian novel with its roots in the truth can be. Beautifully told and with a stunning wilderness setting, the book will take you on a journey to the edges of endurance but still leave you with a spark of hope. 

Audiobook Review: THE TESTAMENTS by Margaret Atwood

Title: THE TESTAMENTS

Author: Margaret Atwood
Read: May 2020

Expected publication: out now

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟

"You don't believe the sky is falling until a chunk of it falls on you."

My musings:

There isn't really anything I can say that hasn't been said already in any of the 18,000 or so reviews on Goodreads of Margaret Atwood's highly anticipated sequel to THE HANDMAID'S TALE, so I will keep it short and sweet. I fall into camp "really enjoyed it". Whilst THE TESTAMENTS may not have packed the same punch as its predecessor, I thoroughly enjoyed learning more about the origins of Gilead and the fate of baby Nicole. I especially appreciated hearing from Aunt Lydia's POV, having found her to be one of the most intriguing characters in the TV adaption of THE HANDMAID'S TALE. It was fascinating to see how society could suddenly disintegrate into the nightmarish Gilead scene, though watching the news these days nothing really surprises me any more.

Whilst I did not enjoy the teenage voices as much as Aunt Lydia's, Atwood does a great job in pointing out the contrast between the two worlds - Gilead and Canada - through the differing POVs of her two young characters.

Summary:

All in all, after feeling very skeptical about how anything could possibly ever live up to a literary masterpiece like THE HANDMAID'S TALE, I was pleasantly surprised about how much I did end up enjoying it. Yes, maybe it is now as powerful or literary as its predecessor, but it made for quite compelling reading, further enhanced by an excellent audiobook narration by various narrators, including Ann Dowd as the original voice of Aunt Lydia. If you go into this one without expectations and judge it on its own merit you will probably get a lot more enjoyment out of it than constantly drawing comparisons to its prequel.

Book Review: THE PASSENGERS by John Marrs

Title: THE PASSENGERS

Author: John Marrs
Publisher: Berkley
Read: August 2019

Expected publication: 27 August 2019

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟1/2

Book Description:

You're riding in your self-driving car when suddenly the doors lock, the route changes and you have lost all control. Then, a mysterious voice tells you, "You are going to die."

Just as self-driving cars become the trusted, safer norm, eight people find themselves in this terrifying situation, including a faded TV star, a pregnant young woman, an abused wife fleeing her husband, an illegal immigrant, a husband and wife, and a suicidal man.

From cameras hidden in their cars, their panic is broadcast to millions of people around the world. But the public will show their true colors when they are asked, "Which of these people should we save?...And who should we kill first?"

My musings:

On our visit to the city this weekend, we saw Perth’s first driverless bus, which is a trial of new technology that will apparently “revolutionise transport”. Thanks to Mr Marrs I ran a mile and wouldn’t go near it, much to the puzzlement of other family members, who were intrigued. I will probably keep my old manual rust bucket way past the time every other citizen travels to work in a pneumatic tube or whatever other things they are working on, all because of this book!

Imagine getting into your fancy driverless car to go to work, and you’re busy updating your facebook status or applying your makeup whilst the computerised car takes care of your journey, when it suddenly changes direction. You stare out of the window in disbelief. Then a voice comes over the speaker, telling you that your car is no longer under your control. And in all likelihood, you will soon be dead ....

THE PASSENGERS is a fast paced thriller that describes what happens when eight driverless cars are being hijacked and programmed to collide in one chilling act of – what? Terrorism? Murder? Revenge? We don’t know yet, except that the man who calls himself “the Hacker” is ruthless and will not hesitate to kill an innocent person to get his way. But Marrs doesn’t just stop there and let a single evil entity do all his grunt work. No, he very cleverly brings in the public through social media and news coverage, and it’s no surprise that soon everyone is glued to a live streaming of the drama unfolding and has an opinion on it. We seem to be so full of entitlement and have so many opinions nowadays, don’t we? Well, the stakes have just been raised, because it is the public who will decide which one of the passengers will live and who will die. Based merely on a few choice facts the “hacker” is prepared to release. And don’t we all jump to conclusions immediately, eager to condemn someone to death? Mr Marrs, you know how to chill us to the core by exposing the ugly side of human nature and the potholes of social media!

THE PASSENGERS  is an extremely clever book, which will not only chill you to the core but also test your own pre-conceptions and prejudices as you, a member the public, will have to make a life or death situation on who gets to live and who has to die. If you don’t decide, everyone will die. So who would you save? And why? And when new information comes to light, will you still think the same? In a way, the story unravels clue by clue like an old-fashioned whodunit, except that the death has not occurred yet. I admit, I was ready to throw my vote in the pot, only to be gobsmacked when new information came to light. And I found myself totally glued to the pages as this drama unfolded.

I admit that the story lost a bit of steam for me once the passenger situation had been revealed and I was coming off the adrenaline high. However, as John Marrs’ books tend to do, this story stayed in my mind long after the last page had been turned, and I was itching to discuss it. It’s one of those books you should read with a buddy, someone you can text at 2 a.m. with a WTH??? message and then hotly debate your different opinions. This book made for an an excellent group read, and entertained as well as challenged our thought processes. It’s a story that chilled me to the core because if this is the future, then I may look for a cave to move into with my TBR pile and live off the grid.

Summary:

All in all, John Marrs has once again delivered a clever, original and thrilling story that will appeal to readers across a range of genres and allow for lively debates in group or buddy reads. I devoured this over the course of a day because I had to find out what would happen. Now back into my car hoping that I make it to work safely ....

Thank you to Edelweiss and Berkley for the free electronic copy of this novel and for giving me the opportunity to provide an honest review.

Book Review: BIRD BOX by Josh Malerman

Title: Bird Box

Author: Josh Malerman
Read: August 2017

My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

“How can she expect her children to dream as big as the stars if they can't lift their heads to gaze upon them?” 

Book Description (Goodreads):

Something is out there, something terrifying that must not be seen. One glimpse of it, and a person is driven to deadly violence. No one knows what it is or where it came from.

Five years after it began, a handful of scattered survivors remains, including Malorie and her two young children. Living in an abandoned house near the river, she has dreamed of fleeing to a place where they might be safe. Now that the boy and girl are four, it's time to go, but the journey ahead will be terrifying: twenty miles downriver in a rowboat--blindfolded--with nothing to rely on but her wits and the children’s trained ears. One wrong choice and they will die. Something is following them all the while, but is it man, animal, or monster?

My musings:

Wow – what an utterly compelling and at the same time terrifying read! After shouting out on social media for recommendations from readers for a good “creepy” book, Bird Box by Josh Malerman kept popping up everywhere, and I can see why. I am so glad that I read it, and a big thank you to everyone who recommended it to me.

Told in a dual timeframe, Bird Box tells the story of Malorie and her two young children, who are prisoners in their own home to stay safe from a terrifying presence outside which sends you crazy and kills you if you as much as lay eyes on it. To protect themselves, they must wear a blindfold at all times, navigating the hostile world they live in totally blind, knowing that there is an evil presence out there wishing them harm. As Malorie reflects on the time leading up to her present predicament, the reader slowly finds out how the world ended up being such a dangerous, hostile place for humans. With a constant thread of tension and danger lurking in the background, the book held many absolutely bone chilling moments that made my heart pound and my hair stand on end.

Bird Box is one of the most original stories I have read in a long time, and whilst I am normally not a huge fan of dystopian horror, this one had me captivated from page 1. I couldn’t put it down, and read it in one massive four hour read-a-thon, despite getting in trouble with my family for being totally unsociable. The thought of living in a dangerous world without the benefit of sight to navigate me whilst carrying out chores to ensure my daily survival was so terrifying that a sense of dread prevailed long after I had turned the final page. Rarely does a book leave such a lasting impression on me – I even dreamt about it that night!

Seeing that I don’t want to give any spoilers, I will just leave it at: if you want an original and creepy book, Bird Box is a must-read! Whilst I find many dystopian books either too depressing or too unbelievable, Bird Box struck exactly the right balance to sneak its way into my psyche and haunt me with its utterly terrifying premise. I also loved the way the author did not have to resort to blood, guts and gore to get the heart pounding – the power of the book really lies in the reader’s own imagination. Two days after reading it I still marvel at the miracle of sight – the blue skies, the green grass – knowing that I couldn’t survive without it. A brilliant book, very highly recommended!

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