Take a photo of a barcode or cover
erinreadstheworld 's review for:
The New Wilderness
by Diane Cook
There's two ways I could review The New Wilderness by Diane Cook.
For pure entertainment it hits the mark. The book is a mix of The Hunger Games and The Island with Bear Grylls. In a dystopian future, everyone lives in The City. The air makes children sick, the City is overpopulated, houses are now things of the past and there's only 7 trees left in the city. As an experiment 20 people head into the last wilderness, to see if they can survive and heal their children.
The story unfolds through the eyes of Bea and her young daughter, Agnes. Much of the book focuses on the mother-daughter relationship. The bonds they share and the ways they grow apart. It touches on ancestral skills, living as one with nature and the questions of how the world became almost apocalyptic.
The New Wilderness is an eco-thriller and the plot certainly pulled me in. But other than Bea and Agnes, none of the other characters feel fleshed out. The exploration of their relationship meant that we missed out on seeing more developed minor characters.
The book left me with more questions then what it answered, but not in the good way. Yes, there were lots of interesting questions to ponder in a book that felt like it was only set a generation or two ahead of the present day. Is this where we're headed? Will capitalism and industry completely destroy the natural world?
But I found the further I questioned the book, the easier it became to pick apart. Why do they refer to the mountains on their maps as 'upside down Ws' and not Ms. Why do people show up in the wilderness in sparkly sandals and then walk for months on end with no problems? How do they carry a 40 pound cast iron pan around with them? Why do they carry books they never read? Is there only one City? How come they know so little about what's happening in the world when they're allowed to get mail and packages from their families?
For me this book fell in a similar realm to reality television. It was entertaining enough and it does provide a bit of a commentary on society. However, if you want a speculative fiction that really shatters the way you think of the world, this one won't quite hit the spot.
For pure entertainment it hits the mark. The book is a mix of The Hunger Games and The Island with Bear Grylls. In a dystopian future, everyone lives in The City. The air makes children sick, the City is overpopulated, houses are now things of the past and there's only 7 trees left in the city. As an experiment 20 people head into the last wilderness, to see if they can survive and heal their children.
The story unfolds through the eyes of Bea and her young daughter, Agnes. Much of the book focuses on the mother-daughter relationship. The bonds they share and the ways they grow apart. It touches on ancestral skills, living as one with nature and the questions of how the world became almost apocalyptic.
The New Wilderness is an eco-thriller and the plot certainly pulled me in. But other than Bea and Agnes, none of the other characters feel fleshed out. The exploration of their relationship meant that we missed out on seeing more developed minor characters.
The book left me with more questions then what it answered, but not in the good way. Yes, there were lots of interesting questions to ponder in a book that felt like it was only set a generation or two ahead of the present day. Is this where we're headed? Will capitalism and industry completely destroy the natural world?
But I found the further I questioned the book, the easier it became to pick apart. Why do they refer to the mountains on their maps as 'upside down Ws' and not Ms. Why do people show up in the wilderness in sparkly sandals and then walk for months on end with no problems? How do they carry a 40 pound cast iron pan around with them? Why do they carry books they never read? Is there only one City? How come they know so little about what's happening in the world when they're allowed to get mail and packages from their families?
For me this book fell in a similar realm to reality television. It was entertaining enough and it does provide a bit of a commentary on society. However, if you want a speculative fiction that really shatters the way you think of the world, this one won't quite hit the spot.