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A review by ihateprozac
Shift by Hugh Howey
4.0
Wool can be described as a straight line: it follows the perspectives of a few key characters in Silo 18 as they propel down a straight line of time and space, en route to a destination or conclusion as yet unknown. Shift is akin to a big ball of wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff (cheers, Doctor Who!), with a host of unreliable narrators across pre-silo America, Silo 1, Silo 17, and Silo 18 traversing back and forth through time over a period of 400-odd years.
So while Wool quietly turns dystopian tropes on their head, Shift turns what we know about Wool on its head!
While Wool focused solely on Holston, Jahns, Juliette, and Lukas in Silo 18 across a period of a year or two, Shift chops and changes between pre-silo America and the building of the silos; the day the bombs went off; the loss of the first few silos; the loss of Silo 17; the Great Uprising in silo 18; and the current uprising in silo 18. We hear from the congressman who designed the silos; the leader of silo 1; a young porter during the Great Uprising in 18; and Jimmy/Solo in the years after Silo 17’s loss. Eventually the end of the novel converges at the current uprising of silo 18, making it clear that the third novel Dust will finally thrust all of these characters onto the same stage.
And while the non-linear storyline and unreliable narrators can be frustrating at times, I learned soooooo much about Silo 1 that it was totally worth it! We get to see the congressman who designed the Silos and that the truth behind their use/intention was hidden even from him. We get to see one of the heads of Silo 1 as they’re awoken from cryo several times over the centuries - primarily to stop Silos from civil war. And then we discover that said congressman and Silo Shepherd ARE ONE AND THE SAME! I found myself cluing in as I progressed through the novel, asking myself “Are Donald and Troy the same guy?” but was still super shocked when Howey unveiled the twist!
In my review of Wool I posed a series of questions as to whether the Silo 1 heads are truly evil, and in spite of the silos' original purpose, can the current management can really be held accountable for the sins of their fathers? Shift makes it very clear: the answer is no. The three men who conceived the silos and destroyed the earth were very much the nefarious villains you’d imagine them to be, but the designer of the silos and Shepherd from Silo 1, Donald, is going to be the hero of this story.
Donald showed incredible character development, and each time I was presented with a non-Donald/Troy chapter I was disgruntled, wanting to see more of the reluctant shepherd. His pain and frustration was so real: as Donald he experienced relatable frustrations and hardships like working under an intimidating boss; completing projects that he hadn’t been given the full backstory on; being forced to work with someone he has unresolved feelings for; and trying to maintain a long-distance relationship all the while.
As Troy, his problems were a little less relatable, and yet it was easy to empathise as he struggled to live up to the expectations everyone in Silo 1 had of him. I could empathise with not feeling qualified to keep the silos alive, essentially relying on a book and just making it up as you go along. I could empathise with the hurt he felt as he uncovered yet another secret of Thurman's. I could empathise with his struggle to bring the system down from the inside without setting off any red flags. And I could empathise with him as he learned that Helen had lived a full life without him and that Anna had engineered the whole damn thing.
While I adored Donald/Troy’s chapters, I wasn’t a fan of Solo/Jimmy’s. While I should’ve felt sorry for him and been keen to see how a 16 year old boy deals with surviving a major disaster, I just didn’t feel any sort of connection to or interest in him. I found myself skimming his chapters, and the only point of interest was that he had a cat and apparently killed the parents of the children Juliette would later discover in 17. It's interesting that he's so psychologically stunted that he hadn't realised he'd killed a pregnant woman (I assume there's no sex ed in the silos...?) but I didn't care enough to dwell on it.
And I’m a bit confused about Thurman’s intent behind the silos and this mythical concept of D-Day/E-Day. If Thurman didn’t intend for anyone outside of Silo 1 to survive the 500 year underground quarantine, why even bother creating multiple silos? If you only wanted the best of the best to survive and emerge in 500 years when the world has reset itself, why not just populate one silo with the best of civilisation? Are the silos just social experiments to guide how they’ll stratify society once they emerge above ground? Or is there some other motivation?
Overall:I loved how Shift diverged from the events in Wool and took us on an adventure across timelines and characters, and I’m interested to see how things converge back in the “present”. If yarn were time, Wool was a ball of yarn slowly unravelling in a straight line, while Shift was a tangled mess of yarn that’s been crushed at the bottom of your grandmother’s linen cupboard for years. So I’m interested to see how Dust manages to marry all of these storylines back together!
I’m curious to see how Juliette and Donald interact in the present, as both are working to undo the secrets of the silo - except Donald can’t let anybody know he’s doing so! I’m curious to see what secrets Thurman was yet to unveil before this death. I’m curious about the side effects of the truth: will it bring peace to the silos, or will humanity continue to destroy itself in a case of history repeating? I’m curious as to whether other pockets of survivors exist across the globe. And I’m curious to see if the world is ever rid of the nanites…...will the silo-verse learn the truth, but be forever doomed to live in darkness? Or will our survivors ascend the rolling green hills together?
So while Wool quietly turns dystopian tropes on their head, Shift turns what we know about Wool on its head!
While Wool focused solely on Holston, Jahns, Juliette, and Lukas in Silo 18 across a period of a year or two, Shift chops and changes between pre-silo America and the building of the silos; the day the bombs went off; the loss of the first few silos; the loss of Silo 17; the Great Uprising in silo 18; and the current uprising in silo 18. We hear from the congressman who designed the silos; the leader of silo 1; a young porter during the Great Uprising in 18; and Jimmy/Solo in the years after Silo 17’s loss. Eventually the end of the novel converges at the current uprising of silo 18, making it clear that the third novel Dust will finally thrust all of these characters onto the same stage.
And while the non-linear storyline and unreliable narrators can be frustrating at times, I learned soooooo much about Silo 1 that it was totally worth it! We get to see the congressman who designed the Silos and that the truth behind their use/intention was hidden even from him. We get to see one of the heads of Silo 1 as they’re awoken from cryo several times over the centuries - primarily to stop Silos from civil war. And then we discover that said congressman and Silo Shepherd ARE ONE AND THE SAME! I found myself cluing in as I progressed through the novel, asking myself “Are Donald and Troy the same guy?” but was still super shocked when Howey unveiled the twist!
In my review of Wool I posed a series of questions as to whether the Silo 1 heads are truly evil, and in spite of the silos' original purpose, can the current management can really be held accountable for the sins of their fathers? Shift makes it very clear: the answer is no. The three men who conceived the silos and destroyed the earth were very much the nefarious villains you’d imagine them to be, but the designer of the silos and Shepherd from Silo 1, Donald, is going to be the hero of this story.
Donald showed incredible character development, and each time I was presented with a non-Donald/Troy chapter I was disgruntled, wanting to see more of the reluctant shepherd. His pain and frustration was so real: as Donald he experienced relatable frustrations and hardships like working under an intimidating boss; completing projects that he hadn’t been given the full backstory on; being forced to work with someone he has unresolved feelings for; and trying to maintain a long-distance relationship all the while.
As Troy, his problems were a little less relatable, and yet it was easy to empathise as he struggled to live up to the expectations everyone in Silo 1 had of him. I could empathise with not feeling qualified to keep the silos alive, essentially relying on a book and just making it up as you go along. I could empathise with the hurt he felt as he uncovered yet another secret of Thurman's. I could empathise with his struggle to bring the system down from the inside without setting off any red flags. And I could empathise with him as he learned that Helen had lived a full life without him and that Anna had engineered the whole damn thing.
While I adored Donald/Troy’s chapters, I wasn’t a fan of Solo/Jimmy’s. While I should’ve felt sorry for him and been keen to see how a 16 year old boy deals with surviving a major disaster, I just didn’t feel any sort of connection to or interest in him. I found myself skimming his chapters, and the only point of interest was that he had a cat and apparently killed the parents of the children Juliette would later discover in 17. It's interesting that he's so psychologically stunted that he hadn't realised he'd killed a pregnant woman (I assume there's no sex ed in the silos...?) but I didn't care enough to dwell on it.
And I’m a bit confused about Thurman’s intent behind the silos and this mythical concept of D-Day/E-Day. If Thurman didn’t intend for anyone outside of Silo 1 to survive the 500 year underground quarantine, why even bother creating multiple silos? If you only wanted the best of the best to survive and emerge in 500 years when the world has reset itself, why not just populate one silo with the best of civilisation? Are the silos just social experiments to guide how they’ll stratify society once they emerge above ground? Or is there some other motivation?
Overall:I loved how Shift diverged from the events in Wool and took us on an adventure across timelines and characters, and I’m interested to see how things converge back in the “present”. If yarn were time, Wool was a ball of yarn slowly unravelling in a straight line, while Shift was a tangled mess of yarn that’s been crushed at the bottom of your grandmother’s linen cupboard for years. So I’m interested to see how Dust manages to marry all of these storylines back together!
I’m curious to see how Juliette and Donald interact in the present, as both are working to undo the secrets of the silo - except Donald can’t let anybody know he’s doing so! I’m curious to see what secrets Thurman was yet to unveil before this death. I’m curious about the side effects of the truth: will it bring peace to the silos, or will humanity continue to destroy itself in a case of history repeating? I’m curious as to whether other pockets of survivors exist across the globe. And I’m curious to see if the world is ever rid of the nanites…...will the silo-verse learn the truth, but be forever doomed to live in darkness? Or will our survivors ascend the rolling green hills together?