Science Fiction | Book Chatter

Oryx and Crake
By Margaret Atwood
Vintage, 2004, 400pp.

The Short of It:

You know when they say that books should make you feel things? Yeah. Oryx and Crake will definitely leave you feeling things.

The Rest of It:

*No Spoilers*

I purchased this book at least a decade ago. I started it a few times and couldn’t get into it, but then a group of us online picked it as a book club pick, and so I looked for my copy, found it (amazing given the pile of books I have) and dove in.

I’ll be careful not to give much away because most of what you feel while reading it, is shock and dismay that such things can exist, and actually do today.

Atwood describes a bleak world. There is the before, and then there is the after. As a reader, you get a glimpse of how we got here but there is much left to the imagination as to what prompted it all. Dystopian worlds are bleak and lifeless but with Oryx and Crake, the story is teeming with life but in the most disturbing way.

Animals are hybrids. For example, Raccoons and Skunks become their own breed. Pigs? Something else entirely. People, aka humanoids, run around without clothing as there is no need for it. Food is scarce. But just like now, there are the HAVES and the HAVE NOTS. The Haves are pulling the strings and everything in this story is Biblical in nature.

Think Adam and Eve and the serpent.

Oryx and Crake is part of a trilogy which includes The Year of the Flood and MaddAddam. This book was a tough read. It was hard on my soul. Not just because of the times we are living in, but because the subject matter is delicate and that is why I will include a trigger warning here for sexual content because Atwood does not handle it in a delicate way. It’s front and center, in your face. I had to put the book down a few times but since it was a group read, I kept going.

Atwood called this story a “romance” and that just blows my mind.

Will I read the others in the trilogy? Probably, yes. Because as numb as we can all be to the nonsense of this world, you have to feel things now and then to know that you are still here.

Source: Purchased
Disclosure: This post contains Bookshop.org affiliate links.

All the Water in the World
By Eiren Caffall
St. Martin’s Press, 9781250353528, January 7, 2025, 304 pp.

The Short of It:

Compelling and impossible to put aside. I am still thinking about these characters.

The Rest of It:

The glaciers have melted. Nonie and her family take refuge in the American Museum of Natural History. Nonie’s mother was a researcher there. Those who still had keys in their possession made a home for themselves, only taking from the exhibits when absolutely needed. Finding comfort in the memories of the past, they do their best to preserve and record what they can.

Food is grown in Central Park with the help of others, but after the Hypercane storm, which Nonie predicted, their food stores are gone and they barely make it back to the museum as the worst of it hits. Other families, snatched by the horrific winds leave only their startled faces behind as Nonie replays it over and over again in her mind.

All the world is under water. The story alternates between The World as It Was and The World as it Is. Nonie, naturally gifted with the ability to detect the big storms, becomes a crucial piece of this group as they navigate up the Hudson to what they perceive to be a safe place.

Nonie, her older sister Bix, her father and a family friend named Keller, take off in a canoe with packs on their backs and head into the hostile unknown.

I was absolutely riveted by this book. It’s a harrowing tale of survival. The love that this family has for one another, and the lengths they go to protect each other kept me glued to the pages. Their journey is not easy. They encounter danger at every turn, food scarcity, illness and injury.

As they push through, Nonie can’t help but think of the “before”. These memories are sweet and heartbreaking. Her resilience is admirable as she rallies this family of hers with hope for the future.

The writing is amazing and relentless. Caffall takes you by the hand and doesn’t let go. YOU are in that canoe, feeling those hunger pains, terrified of what tomorrow brings. If the glaciers melted tomorrow this story would be our reality. Terrifying and brutal.

Who do they encounter? Who do they lose along the way? How does one survive when everything is covered in water?

Apocalyptic stories can be too heavy but this one has hope written all over it. It comes out January 7th! Highly recommend. It will be on my fave list at the end of the year.

Source: Review copy provided by the publisher.
Disclosure: This post contains Indiebound affiliate links.

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