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tomleetang 's review for:
The New Wilderness
by Diane Cook
If we had to return to the wilderness and abandon the creature comforts of the city, would we revert to primitive societal models? Would all the humanism and rationalism and philosophy of hundreds of years fall away as we were confronted by the often harsh reality of living in nature?
In a word, yes, at least according to Diane Cook. The New Wilderness kicks off several years into a (somewhat unscientific) experiment to see how people cope with returning to nature and living off the land; the people involved are guided/constrained by a manual designed to ensure they create a minimal footprint in the last wilderness in North America. By the beginning, half of the original 20 participants have died, and the survivors seem only slightly fazed when another person follows suit in the first few pages.
The group are all former inhabitants of the City, a briefly sketched place where extensive pollution has led to some children becoming fatally ill. The author keeps the details vague, the City (which stands in for all cities) is unimportant other than as a symbol of man's failure to limit damage to the environment - though this point is made implicit, rather than through direct harangue. This is not a book that rants about eco-consciousness, even if man's effect on the world is central to the novel.
The shape of the community reminded me a lot of Lord of the Flies, but with adults who act like children instead of actual children. In fact, the children of the the Lord of the Flies had more intellectual discussions than this rather unlikable lot, who do a lot of screaming and shouting and not a lot of reasoning. It's telling that the professor in their midst, who tries to use intellect, is overwhelmed by the forceful personality of a classic patriarchal figure who rules through aggression; Carl's only equal is Bea, one of the book's two main characters, who uses emotional intelligence to sway the minds of the community.
I did find the whole set-up a bit far-fetched - would humans really regress that rapidly into tribal behaviour? I turned to Google and started reading about a reality TV show called Eden, where participants went to live off the land in rural Scotland - and quickly descended into misogyny and bullying. Perhaps it isn't so far-fetched after all, though I still question whether people would really adapt to leaving their companions to die so readily.
Nestled within the story of the breakdown of modern civilization is a mother-daughter tale about the conflict between one generation and another. The miscommunication and misunderstanding and emotional tug-of-war between Bea and Agnes is arguably the most convincing aspect of The New Wilderness, and Cook has managed to make it feel an organic part of the overall narrative - this, for me, is the greatest achievement of this novel.
And yet, I put down this book thinking, something is missing here, but what is it? Is it that our world and the sometime-in-the-near-future world of The New Wilderness don't quite seem to fit together? Is it that the Community manage to live in the wild for so long without really forming friendships or attachments with one another? Is it that there are books out there that go further in evoking environmental collapse, or mother-daughter relationships, or a return to a more primitive, brutal way of life, and so everything in this novel feels a little tamer and less adventurous? The first two points are niggling concerns, but I think it's the last point than ultimately left me feeling a bit 'meh' about the whole thing.
In a word, yes, at least according to Diane Cook. The New Wilderness kicks off several years into a (somewhat unscientific) experiment to see how people cope with returning to nature and living off the land; the people involved are guided/constrained by a manual designed to ensure they create a minimal footprint in the last wilderness in North America. By the beginning, half of the original 20 participants have died, and the survivors seem only slightly fazed when another person follows suit in the first few pages.
The group are all former inhabitants of the City, a briefly sketched place where extensive pollution has led to some children becoming fatally ill. The author keeps the details vague, the City (which stands in for all cities) is unimportant other than as a symbol of man's failure to limit damage to the environment - though this point is made implicit, rather than through direct harangue. This is not a book that rants about eco-consciousness, even if man's effect on the world is central to the novel.
The shape of the community reminded me a lot of Lord of the Flies, but with adults who act like children instead of actual children. In fact, the children of the the Lord of the Flies had more intellectual discussions than this rather unlikable lot, who do a lot of screaming and shouting and not a lot of reasoning. It's telling that the professor in their midst, who tries to use intellect, is overwhelmed by the forceful personality of a classic patriarchal figure who rules through aggression; Carl's only equal is Bea, one of the book's two main characters, who uses emotional intelligence to sway the minds of the community.
I did find the whole set-up a bit far-fetched - would humans really regress that rapidly into tribal behaviour? I turned to Google and started reading about a reality TV show called Eden, where participants went to live off the land in rural Scotland - and quickly descended into misogyny and bullying.
Spoiler
A group of men in Eden who put themselves in charge of rations even discussed starving some of the other people to weaken them and make them leave - an act that also takes place (in a slightly different form) in The New Wilderness.Nestled within the story of the breakdown of modern civilization is a mother-daughter tale about the conflict between one generation and another. The miscommunication and misunderstanding and emotional tug-of-war between Bea and Agnes is arguably the most convincing aspect of The New Wilderness, and Cook has managed to make it feel an organic part of the overall narrative - this, for me, is the greatest achievement of this novel.
And yet, I put down this book thinking, something is missing here, but what is it? Is it that our world and the sometime-in-the-near-future world of The New Wilderness don't quite seem to fit together? Is it that the Community manage to live in the wild for so long without really forming friendships or attachments with one another? Is it that there are books out there that go further in evoking environmental collapse, or mother-daughter relationships, or a return to a more primitive, brutal way of life, and so everything in this novel feels a little tamer and less adventurous? The first two points are niggling concerns, but I think it's the last point than ultimately left me feeling a bit 'meh' about the whole thing.