The Life Impossible

I tried to read Matt Haig's earlier best seller, The Midnight Library, and, in spite of rave reviews, just could not get engaged. This book also caused me to struggle through the first few chapters before I became more engrossed with the characters and the plotting. The New York Times called this book "a love letter filled with magic."  Protagonist Grace is a retired mathematics teacher who describes herself in the book as “Don Quixote dressed in Marks & Spencer.” The Times provides this summary:

"Grace is grappling with loss. She’s a recent-ish widow, and she’s also still grieving the death of her son, Daniel, who died three decades prior, when he was just 9 years old. Since losing her immediate family, her life has shrunk so drastically that “she only had two contacts on her WhatsApp — Angela from the British Heart Foundation and Sophie, her sister-in-law, who had moved to Perth in Australia 33 years ago.” This might have been maudlin, but Haig lightens the mood, including with cheeky chapter titles (Grace’s initial tale of woe arrives under the heading “Sob Story”).The novel opens with a cry-for-help email from one of Grace’s former students, Maurice Augustine, who is despairing that “everything feels impossible.” The book we hold is Grace’s sprawling response. To comfort Maurice, she shares her own story about “a person who felt there was no point left in her existence, and then found the greatest purpose she had ever known.”Her tale is set in motion by “an act of kindness long ago”: In 1979, Grace invited Christina Papadakis, a colleague she barely knew, to spend Christmas Day with her. When Christina vanishes and is presumed dead in Ibiza decades later, she leaves Grace, of all people, her shabby house and a trail of clues about her fate. Officially, Christina “died at sea” — or did she?Cracking the case of Christina’s disappearance forces Grace, who self-soothes with tedious mental equations and thoughts on theorems, to open her logical mind to the paranormal. “The only thing you have to believe at this point is that there is a possibility that we don’t know every single thing about life in the universe,” Grace writes to Maurice. “Is that possible?” In attempting to convince Grace, Haig moved even this skeptical reader to consider that science and magic aren’t mutually exclusive.Grace’s search for answers is filled with adventure (including a midnight scuba dive and a 2 a.m. club jaunt), comedy (via an enigmatic seaman named Alberto Ribas whose “general aesthetic seemed to be halfway between unrehabilitated caveman and pirate”) and vivid bursts of magical realism."

Kirkus concludes their review by saying "...the author’s insistence on the power of connection to change lives comes through loud and clear. Haig’s positive message will keep his fans happy." Publishers Weekly gushes that the novel is "magnificent" and closes "In Haig’s sure hands, magic comes to breathtaking life."

Among the Living

This is the newest release (Feb. 2024) of horror and fantasy author Tim Lebbon, an author new to me; I am a fan of some fantasy but not so much horror.  I would also characterize this book as speculative fiction, i.e., near possible future scenarios. Set in our world, now in advancing climate change, we encounter two teams with opposite goals. One is a team of 4 rare mineral prospectors, exploring areas that were previous inaccessible before the planet warmed up, and the other team of 3 are eco-activists, trying to prevent further destruction of a dramatically changing world. On team 1 is Dean, whose growing unease about what they are doing causes him to send an email to former friend Bethan, a member of team 2;  team 2 is not on the same island by chance, but due to Dean's warning. It reminds me of "The Body Snatchers," except, instead of aliens from another world, the threat comes from within our own. I'll let Publishers Weekly offer a further summary in their review.

"Combining a plausible existential threat with vivid depictions of a forbidding landscape, Lebbon (The Last Storm) crafts an expert work of ecological horror. In the near future, catastrophic climate change has so devastated the planet that America’s drought-afflicted farming belt is now known as the Desert. The demand for new sources of rare-earth minerals leads four experts to the Arctic’s Hawkshead Island, where they’ve identified a cave system that could yield riches. But when they enter, the researchers encounter an unusual group of mummified human remains, apparently tens of thousands of years old. Despite every indication that the bodies are long dead, one of them, whose head is in “an impossible position,” appears to move, sending the expedition members fleeing for their lives. When three of the four emerge from the caves, they meet another team, this one comprising activists and ecoterrorists, who are concerned that the intrusion may have unleashed a contagious intelligent disease that could kill every human on Earth. Lebbon skillfully exploits the very real concern that melting permafrost could release deadly viruses to create a nail-biting scientific thriller worthy of Michael Crichton. Readers will be wowed."

The New York Times brief review recommends it. "This novel is wildly entertaining. The ragtag band of survivors must traverse dangerous, unpredictable terrain full of snow bears and sinkholes, all while fighting creatures that emerge from the ground. The tension and violence are as aggressive as a revving engine here, but Lebbon’s timely message — that hurting our planet is hurting ourselves — is just as loud."