Amanda and Clay head to a remote corner of Long Island expecting a holiday: a quiet reprieve from life in New York City, quality time with their teenage son and daughter and a taste of the good life in the luxurious home they've rented for the week. But with a late-night knock on the door, the spell is broken. Ruth and G. H., an older couple who claim to own the home, have arrived there in a panic. These strangers say that a sudden power outage has swept the city, and - with nowhere else to turn - they have come to the country in search of shelter.
But with the TV and internet down, and no phone service, the facts are unknowable. Should Amanda and Clay trust this couple - and vice versa? What has happened back in New York? Is the holiday home, isolated from civilisation, a truly safe place for their families? And are they safe from one another?
"You demanded answers, but the universe refused. Comfort and safety were just an illusion. Money meant nothing. All that meant anything was this - people, in the same place, together. This was what was left to them."
It’s time to revisit a world that was left behind ahead of the brand new Netflix adaptation coming something soon!
A relaxing weekend away turns into the stuff of nightmares in this intriguing literary suspense story. A quiet, calm version of a world-changing dystopia but with all the intensity and stomach-dropping fear of a cinematic end of the world tale.
The prose is richly descriptive, poetic and lyrical at times with a deeply visual style that paints a picture with words. It portrays the isolation, the fear, the unknown in such a palpable way that you can feel your heart pounding in your chest. This was a unique story that focuses on the before, not the aftermath and decimation of a dystopia - something that felt so possible and terrifying real. I loved the striking detail that made you pay attention to everything (Even if sometimes there was a little too much description of details like grocery shopping, and quite a bit too much time spent on describing genitals.)
Whilst our two families are trying to find out the truth about what’s happening out there in the rest of the world, there’s a sense of reflection and thoughtfulness about our place in the world and what we leave behind when we eventually depart. We watch on as our characters tell their stories in the third person and unravel the mysteries not only about what’s happening outside in the world but also between their walls, allowing us to see everyone’s thoughts in turn although at times it felt quite distant; with the external narrator switching between characters sometimes mid-paragraph. Whether it was the literary style or the cohesive voice across all the characters that made their personalities a little different to find, it did take me a while to get to know them and find my rhythm. The pacing was odd, glacially slow and leisurely, confined to the walls of one shared home and these two families but still kept moving along steadily.
A curious story about endings and beginnings told with an inquisitive, thoughtful voice.
- Leave The World Behind is available now. I received a reviewers copy of this title in return for a review.
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