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A review by alongreader
The Never-Ending End of the World by Ann Christy
5.0
This is a mind melter in the best kind of way! I've seen time loops represented in media before - I live in the world and watch TV and movies and read books - but never like this. This is really something special.
The story stretches over about twenty years, with a few flashbacks extending that here and there. There's also a second narrator, and they narrate in chunks - so it'll be Coco for five or six chapters, then the other one for five or six, then back to Coco. It's a good way to show more of the world than one person could see, and a good way to explain things to us a bit, as they discuss various theories and ideas.
I kind of understood a bit the resolution, sort of, in general, but it doesn't really matter; we don't need to understand why it happened, not in detail. The story is in how people react, how they learn to deal or not to deal, how to come together or fall apart. For that alone, even if you don't like speculative fiction, this is worth a read.
It can also make you a bit paranoid - how do I know I'm not trapped in a loop of writing this? How do you know you're not trapped in a loop of reading it? (If you are, my profound apologies; there are so many better things you could be trapped in a loop doing!)
I loved the epilogue and would love to revisit this world to see how they're going to deal with things - but I always want to know what happens after the end, so take that as you like! I will certainly be looking out for more books by Ann in the future, I look forward to seeing what other old cliches she can make completely new again.
The story stretches over about twenty years, with a few flashbacks extending that here and there. There's also a second narrator, and they narrate in chunks - so it'll be Coco for five or six chapters, then the other one for five or six, then back to Coco. It's a good way to show more of the world than one person could see, and a good way to explain things to us a bit, as they discuss various theories and ideas.
I kind of understood a bit the resolution, sort of, in general, but it doesn't really matter; we don't need to understand why it happened, not in detail. The story is in how people react, how they learn to deal or not to deal, how to come together or fall apart. For that alone, even if you don't like speculative fiction, this is worth a read.
It can also make you a bit paranoid - how do I know I'm not trapped in a loop of writing this? How do you know you're not trapped in a loop of reading it? (If you are, my profound apologies; there are so many better things you could be trapped in a loop doing!)
I loved the epilogue and would love to revisit this world to see how they're going to deal with things - but I always want to know what happens after the end, so take that as you like! I will certainly be looking out for more books by Ann in the future, I look forward to seeing what other old cliches she can make completely new again.