The End We Start From
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3.0 • 11 Ratings
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
The universally acclaimed debut novel. “Extraordinary . . . a spare, futuristic fable about a brand-new mother navigating a flooded world.”—Vogue.com
Pre-empted by publishers around the world within days of the 2016 London Book Fair, The End We Start From heralds the arrival of Megan Hunter, a dazzling and unique literary talent. Hunter’s debut is a searing original, a modern-day parable of rebirth and renewal, of maternal bonds, and the instinct to survive and thrive in the absence of all that’s familiar.
As London is submerged below flood waters, a woman gives birth to her first child, Z. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place, shelter to shelter, to a desolate island and back again. The story traces fear and wonder, as the baby’s small fists grasp at the first colors he sees, as he grows and stretches, thriving and content against all the odds.
Written with poise and poeticism, The End We Start From is an indelible and elemental first book—a lyrical vision of the strangeness and beauty of new motherhood, and a portentous tale of endurance in the face of ungovernable change.
“Strange and powerful, and very apt for these uncertain times. I was moved, terrified, uplifted—sometimes all three at once. It takes skill to manage that, and Hunter has a poet’s understanding of how to make each word count.”—Tracy Chevalier, New York Times bestselling author of The Girl with a Pearl Earring
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The postapocalyptic literary novel is currently in vogue almost to the point of redundancy, but Hunter's slim yet sharp debut offers a level of precision and interiority rarely seen in the genre. The novel opens with an unnamed narrator giving birth to her first child, known only as Z, just as a mysterious and devastating flood overtakes London. But rather than focus on the specifics of the catastrophe, the story instead becomes an investigation of the tumultuous internal life of a new mother. The scaffolding of the apocalypse narrative hiding out from potential threats while also endlessly searching for supplies, trying to establish normalcy in the face of the unknown as sacrifices and forays into dangerous territory become increasingly necessary serve more as a backdrop to the strangeness of a new human life. The narrator forges relationships with other survivors as she moves from place to place in search of safety and community, but the journey toward recognizing the world for what it has become is made all the more poignant as she begins to see it through the eyes of Z, a child who has never known it to be anything other than what it is now. Told in a voice that is by turns meditative, desperate, and hopeful, this novel showcases Hunter's considerable talents and range.
Customer Reviews
Enticing but not fulfilling
There is no depth to this story. No sense of movement, plot or conclusion. It felt almost like I was reading a dull medical article with no introduction or conclusion. There was no depth of the story, and the author provided so few details of what was happening that it was nearly impossible to understand. This was not a novel or even a novella, it was just snippets of broken writing that were slapped together like a mosaic of confusion.