Gethan Dick’s stunning debut is a thought-provoking post-apocalyptic novel, fizzing with energy, anger, fear and ultimately hope. Water in the Desert Fire in the Night will appeal to fans of Claire
Kilroy, Megan Hunter and Cormac McCarthy.
Here is a novel about hope, wolves, companionship and resilience, hunger and gold. It’s about an underachieving millennial, a retired midwife and a charismatic Dubliner who set out from London after the end of the world to cycle to a sanctuary in the southern Alps.
It’s about packing light and choosing the right companions and trousers: what’s worth knowing, what’s worth living, and holding on to your sense of humour in moments big and small. It’s about the fact that the world ends all the time. It’s about what to do next.
GETHAN DICK was born in 1980 in Belfast and grew up in the west of Ireland. She moved to London for an MA in Creative and Life Writing at Goldsmiths College. She then studied at Camberwell College of Art and shifted her creative practice towards text-based and co-created visual art. She moved to Marseille, France, where she has lived since 2011, working as one half of visual-arts duo gethan&myles with her partner, Myles Quin.
They have two children, and in her spare time she swims, cycles, jumps off rocks into the sea or heads for the hills.
My thoughts: this was an interesting, thought provoking, funny, and thrilling book about what to do after the end of the world. Four people who live in the same street in Streatham, South London, meet properly for the first time after a mysterious illness has wiped out much of humanity and many animals. Society has collapsed and most of what we rely on has vanished.
Our narrator, Anduz, was raised by her communist parents in Cuba, before they moved to the UK, she’s a fascinating character, fluent in Spanish and German as well as English, she’s the funny, wry observer and protagonist. Joining her are retired midwife Sarah, stoner philosopher Pressure Drop, originally from Dublin, and Adi, who doesn’t quite believe the world he knew has gone.
Sarah has friends in France, living in a place that’s self-sufficient and safe, they just have to get there first. So on bikes with panniers packed full of essentials, the foursome set off, first for the coast to find someone who will sail them to France, and then across the country to their new home.
They meet with many different people along the way, some more welcoming than others, all just trying to survive. There are high points and terrible low ones, fear, love, friendship, community, violence, wild animals and heartbreak.
Through it all we see the relationship between the characters as they travel, evolve and strengthen. They must depend on each other at times for their survival. Their disparate skills and knowledge all that keeps them alive and moving forward.
I really enjoyed this book, I think it’s one that will stay with me for a while after reading, little thoughts popping up every now and then, moments from the book, things my brain is quietly weighing up in the background drifting through. For a first time writer, it’s an accomplished and intelligent debut and deserves to go far.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 