Thank you to the author, publisher Hodder & Stoughton, and online book club The Pigeonhole for the chance to read this. This is an honest and voluntary review. 

 

She is probably the least prepared person to survive the end of the world, but this unnamed narrator has more will to survive than she realises.

 

James’s wife, Xavier and Ginny’s friend. It’s fitting that we never learn the name of the lead character narrator of this book as she defines herself by how other people see her rather than who she wants to be. As the only, as far as she knows, survivor of a pandemic with an almost 100 per cent mortality rate, she has to find her own way in the world with no personal resources to fall back on.

 

It would be fair to say that she makes a lot of mistakes. Many of which seem entirely avoidable. It would be very easy to get annoyed with her, but the more of her backstory which is revealed the clearer it is that she’s not thinking straight. She doesn’t have experience of self-reliance and is living in denial, just getting through a day at a time as her mental well being - not great before the pandemic - gets a thorough bashing by the unprecedented circumstances she finds herself in.

 

I found it a fascinating read. It’s a great journey of self-discovery for the narrator as she learns to rely on herself, but it never becomes too preachy. It reminds me quite a lot of Kate Sawyer’s The Stranding, and manages a similar feat of feeling uplifting despite the dire circumstances. The humour here is a lot more obvious though, and a lot cruder - definitely not one for the easily offended. It’s not done to shock though, but to ground the story in reality.

 

A really enjoyable read.