Gliff
By Ali Smith
Pantheon, 9780593701560, Feb 2025, 288 pp.

The Short of It:

Thought-provoking. A tad terrifying given our current times.

The Rest of It:

An uncertain near-future. A story of new boundaries drawn between people daily. A not-very brave new world.

Add two children. And a horse. ~ the publisher

You know when you pick up a book because you just finished one and you want to keep the momentum going? Gliff was that book for me. I had seen it around. I had absolutely no idea what it was about but it was readily available from the library so I tucked in and fell right into it.

What an odd read.

Gliff -an unexpected view of something startling

Two children. Their parents, no longer around. Are they alive? I think yes, but somewhere else, or possibly living in another time. The children, Briar and Rose quietly fight for their survival as boundary markers, men who walk around marking boundaries around structures, make things disappear.

Living in abandoned structures and existing on canned sustenance, they make an adventure of their current situation. Briar, slightly older than Rose, turns every task into a simple yet critical need, gently hiding how dangerous the situation actually is.

People are desperate and there are bad people. Briar is constantly on the lookout assessing things in order to keep them safe.

Enter the horse.

In one of the abandoned dwellings that they take refuge in, Rose befriends a boy across the way who has a horse. Rose wants to own this horse. It’s not feasible to own a horse in their particular situation but Rose is obsessed with what will become of the horse if she doesn’t step in to save him.

As meager as their means are, they hand over what they have and walk the horse over to their temporary home. They keep him inside, for fear of people seeing him. Realizing how temporary the situation is, Briar heads out, looking for something. Not knowing quite what she’s looking for, she runs into a strange woman.

This woman knows where all the cameras are and which areas of the neighborhood are unseen due to vantage point. She tells Briar about the underground, literally a world living beneath them that is unseen and not monitored. People work there and then return to life after boundaries.

What transpires is not a revolution per se, but an understanding that things must be done in order to live, and escape. Does a better world exist elsewhere? Will Briar be able to reach it given what she knows?

This was a fascinating read. Nothing is spelled out for the reader. You digest it and decide what is going on. If you are the type who needs everything to be clearly wrapped up by that last page, then this might not be for you. I found it to be quite good. Dystopian reads just hit different in these times we are living in.

I recommend this one.

Source: Borrowed
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