Last Exit

Last Exit

Max Gladstone2022
Ten years ago, Zelda led a band of merry adventurers whose knacks let them travel to alternate realities and battle the black rot that threatened to unmake each world. Zelda was the warrior; Ish could locate people anywhere; Ramon always knew what path to take; Sarah could turn catastrophe aside. Keeping them all connected: Sal, Zelda’s lover and the group's heart. Until their final, failed mission, when Sal was lost. When they all fell apart. Ten years on, Ish, Ramon, and Sarah are happy and successful. Zelda is alone, always traveling, destroying rot throughout the US. When it boils through the crack in the Liberty Bell, the rot gives Zelda proof that Sal is alive, trapped somewhere in the alts. Zelda’s getting the band back together—plus Sal’s young cousin June, who has a knack none of them have ever seen before. As relationships rekindle, the friends begin to believe they can find Sal and heal all the worlds. It’s not going to be easy, but they’ve faced worse before. But things have changed, out there in the alts. And in everyone's hearts. Fresh from winning the Hugo and Nebula Awards, Max Gladstone weaves elements of American myth--the muscle car, the open road, the white-hatted cowboy--into a deeply emotional tale where his characters must find their own truths if they are to survive.
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Reviews

Photo of Didi Chanoch
Didi Chanoch@didichanoch
5 stars
Nov 2, 2022

I got my audio copy of this book from Netgalley and the publisher. I've been a Max Gladstone fan for a long time. I loved the craft books, adored "Bookburners," the multi-author audio project he created. His collaboration with Amal El-Mohtar, "This Is How You Lose The Time War" was my favorite book of 2019. So it's fair to say I came in with high expectations. The book met, and then exceeded these expectations. Since people like to invent genres, and I'm people too, let me try and coin a term: LAST EXIT is a work of Quantum Fantasy. This is a subgenre of science fantasy that takes place in our world and/or adjacent worlds, and is informed by quantum physics. The two books I would put in this subgenre are LAST EXIT and Cadwell Turnbull's NO GODS, NO MONSTERS. Both books are dark, deal very much with our current reality, have more than a tinge of horror. Both books are about change and stasis, and have epic plots with finely drawn characters. Gladstone and Turnbull are also both very, very good at the writing thing. I won't talk about plot, here, and even delving into themes can be tricky, spoiler-wise. I will say this books has a fractured found family, friendship and love, and a terrifying and insidious villain. This is a book about trying to fix mistakes, and about how even the smartest people can - in the right circumstances - be idiots. It is also very much a book about trauma. Personal and societal. I think this is the first truly great book I've read in 2022.