Megan Hunter

A startlingly beautiful story of a family's survival, The End We Start From is a haunting but hopeful dystopian vision of a familiar world made dangerous and unstable. 'Engrossing, compelling' - Naomi Alderman, author of The Power 'I was moved, terrified, uplifted – sometimes all three at once' - Tracy Chevalier, author of Girl With a Pearl Earring Megan Hunter's honed and spare prose paints an imagined future as realistic as it is frightening. Though the country is falling apart around them and its people are forced to become refugees, this family’s world – of new life and new hope – sings with love. In the midst of a mysterious environmental crisis, as London is submerged below flood waters, a woman gives birth to her first child. Days later, the family are forced to leave their home in search of safety. As they move from place to place, shelter to shelter, their journey traces both fear and wonder as the baby's small fists grasp at the things he sees, as he grows and stretches, thriving and content against all the odds. With Benedict Cumberbatch calling it ‘a stunning tale of motherhood’, film rights have been sold to his production company SunnyMarch.

The End We Start From

Raihan Khan

I haven't read anything like this before.
It was like reading a poem.
The rhythm she has put in the words 
won't let you stop reading the book until you finish it.

The universally acclaimed debut novel. “Extraordinary . . . a spare, futuristic fable about a brand-new mother navigating a flooded world.”—Vogue.com Pre-empted by publishers around the world within days of the 2016 London Book Fair, The End We Start From heralds the arrival of Megan Hunter, a dazzling and unique literary talent. Hunter’s debut is a searing original, a modern-day parable of rebirth and renewal, of maternal bonds, and the instinct to survive and thrive in the absence of all that’s familiar. As London is submerged below flood waters, a woman gives birth to her first child, Z. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place, shelter to shelter, to a desolate island and back again. The story traces fear and wonder, as the baby’s small fists grasp at the first colors he sees, as he grows and stretches, thriving and content against all the odds. Written with poise and poeticism, The End We Start From is an indelible and elemental first book—a lyrical vision of the strangeness and beauty of new motherhood, and a portentous tale of endurance in the face of ungovernable change. “Strange and powerful, and very apt for these uncertain times. I was moved, terrified, uplifted—sometimes all three at once. It takes skill to manage that, and Hunter has a poet’s understanding of how to make each word count.”—Tracy Chevalier, New York Times bestselling author of The Girl with a Pearl Earring

Jenna

The End We Start From by Megan Hunter is a one-sitting type of book. This book is gorgeous through and through, from the color of the cover to the characters. I picked this up on a whim at my favorite local bookstore and read it that night in one sitting, and it was a five star read for me.

The End We Start From starts in a future where our unnamed narrator is pregnant with her first child, a boy, Z. (Names aren't included in this book - the characters go by their first initial.) In this future, the world is flooding. London becomes uninhabitable and the narrator, Z, and her husband, R, have to flee their home and learn to survive. 

The prose is sparse but poetic. This book had my heart racing and butterflies in my stomach for the whole couple of hours that I read it. We follow our narrator as she lives in her car with her husband and newborn child, through time in refugee camps where R leaves to get some space and doesn't return, and further on her journey into a new future where the world is different AND she is a first time parent. 

I was surprised how much this book made me feel despite being so minimalistic. It made me feel hopeful but deeply sad at the same time. I fell fast and hard for the writing. I recommend this debut dystopia to anyone who likes spare but lyrical words and wants to read something fast and beautiful.

Toni Turner

This was one of the most beautifully written books I've ever had the pleasure to read. A beautiful story of motherhood, and navigating the world with the responsibility of a new born on your hands. It takes these themes to a whole other degree with the overarching plot line being the unstable enivironment collapsing around our main characters and changing their lives drastically. Our main character's thoughts were so fascinating! I feel like this is a novel I can read over and over and over again and always get something new out of. The writing style was just so interesting! I want to dissect it and study it and learn it by heart. I need my own copy once it is released in November. I am going to be studying this thing like it's my job. Hopefully, I'll have a review up soon on my blog (which is a rare occasion)

Sheila Goicea

I received this copy from the publisher via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.

  
    Our city is here, somewhere, but we are not. We are all untied, is the thing. Untethered, floating, drifting, all these things.
  

This was such a weird and uncomfortable read. While I thought the style in which this short story/novella was written was rather artistic, I disliked the crude manner in which everything was described. 

This story tells about a futuristic dystopian era where London is suddenly overtaken by water. Families are forced from their homes, and many separated in the flooding. Written from the perspective of a young mother, she details the experience while nurturing her new son "Z" (Zeb but characters are only mentioned by the first letter in their name) through explanations in the past and present tenses and sometimes somewhere in-between.

Along the way, she is separated from her spouse, "R" and was left to fend for herself and child. While there is certainly a lot going on in their lives with trying to survive, Z serves as a lantern in the dark to those around. The reader passes through stages of the book as Z grows from an infant into a toddler. Everything around him is so dismal and hopeless, yet, he lightens the mood with his meager but notable milestones. 

  
    Luck is one of those words that has no meaning any more, if it ever did.
  

While I've never quite read a book in this fashion, I appreciated its attempts at originality. However, I believe it may serve other readers better, who may enjoy the writing style of someone similar to Margaret Atwood. The vulgar ways of explaining different things (mainly with Z and the motherly roles required of the main character) were most off-putting. I couldn't help but be reminded of the descriptive writing tactics of  The Handmaid's Tale which I absolutely loathed.

Overall, I appreciated the artist manner in which the author told this story. However, the off-putting way in which she described things and need for more atmosphere and grounding made this less enjoyable in my eyes.

Vulgarity: There are a few swear words, I believe. The entire writing style could be considered as vulgar (as stated above) as the author uses descriptive and unpleasant ways of describing bodily functions and reactions between mother and child.
Sexual content: While there are no scenes to be spoken of, there are references to sex in somewhat graphic manners. In particular, in the beginning where the main character is discussing her plans for childbirth, along with reminiscing about her significant other and how he "moved inside her." 
Violence: None.

1.5 stars.

In an alternate-world modern London submerged below flood waters, a woman who has just given birth to her first child is forced to flee her home with her baby to seek refuge in a variety of locations while the baby thrives against all odds.

The End We Start from

Moray Lyle McIntosh

This was not for me. I love stylised writing but it’s easy to get it wrong, and this was all wrong. The staccato, abbreviated writing style felt laboured and was neither beautiful nor insightful enough to be truly poetic. Rather, it was just many, many repetitive sentence structures that left me entirely untouched. The total focus on the baby was tedious rather than poignant, a metaphor that wasn’t elaborate (or elaborated) enough to sustain 160 pages. It lacked both tension and character and didn’t have the depth to carry off the mannered style.

Jeremy Anderberg

Poetic writing, to be sure. But not my cup of tea. I actually wanted a more deeply explored story.

zilver 

"As London is submerged below flood waters, a woman gives birth to her first child, Z. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place. The story traces fear and wonder, as the baby grows, thriving and content against all odds ... a lyrical vision of the strangeness and beauty of new motherhood, and a portentous tale of endurance in the face of ungovernable change"--Page 4 of cover.

Chantale

What did I just read? Seriously I am just confused. 
The description made the book sound interesting but I personally just didn't enjoy it. 

This is not one I recommend and it will not be one I will ever read again. I know some will probably enjoy this book but personally it wasn't for me. Too bad because I do like the cover .

Leafling

Renee Blankenship

The End We Start From by Megan Hunter was graciously sent to my by Grove Atlantic a few weeks ago in exchange for an honest review. Its a rather slim book, one that I knew I could pick up and read fairly quickly. You guys. This book! I turned the last page within an hour and had so much to process once I was finished...for such a small book it packs quite an emotional punch, especially as a mother. 

Written in snippets and short paragraphs, The End We Start From reads almost like a journal. Other characters are named simply by their first initial and the narrator, the mother of baby Z, spends more time talking about her emotions and surroundings than actual or details of events taking place. I love books written this way, where I feel a more realistic connection with the main character and maybe less so with the setting or events taking place. I felt completely immersed in the cocoon of warmth between mother and baby, their lives reliant solely upon the other despite the chaos surrounding them. With my own baby still newly here I felt so much of what the mother was feeling first hand, that dreamlike state nursing gives you in the early still dark morning hours, how that connection between yourself and this little being is so absolute. For me, it made this story all the more real and emotional. 

"The gasping latch, and his breathing slows in the dark. The world inflates and deflates with him, a giant bellows." p. 52

Paired with the dread and panic surrounding them, the unknown of the everyday, there is so much hope wrapped up in baby Z as his mother marvels at his every growth and achievement. I really thought the ending was so perfect. R, the husband, I could honestly have cared less about. He seemed so unimportant, especially when he leaves them behind. Reading through each passage of hope and perseverance between mother and child made this story less of an apocalyptic doomsday type story and more of a study on how a mother's love for her child and a child's absolute dependence on their mother transcends all things. The world falling down around you and this love remains constant. How beautiful is that? 

I highly recommend this story. Its beautiful, precise and brilliantly written. I cannot wait to read more from Megan Hunter! Thank you Grove Atlantic for my copy!

"I'll be recommending this book for years to come. Utterly brilliant, hugely important. Here's the thing: it's perfect." Nathan Filer, author of The Shock of the Fall"Extraordinary ... reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy's The Road" Financial TimesThe mainland is on fire, they say in so many words. After the flood, the fire. I am losing the story. I am forgetting.In the midst of a mysterious environmental crisis, as London is submerged below flood waters, a woman gives birth to her first child, Z. Days later, the family are forced to leave their home in search of safety. As they move from place to place, shelter to shelter, their journey traces both fear and wonder as Z's small fists grasp at the things he sees, as he grows and stretches, thriving and content against all the odds. This is a story of new motherhood in a terrifying setting: a familiar world made dangerous and unstable, its people forced to become refugees. Startlingly beautiful, Megan Hunter's The End We Start From is a gripping novel that paints an imagined future as realistic as it is frightening. And yet, though the country is falling apart around them, this family's world - of new life and new hope - sings with love.MORE PRAISE FOR THE END WE START FROM"The End We Start From is a stunning tale of motherhood. Megan Hunter has crafted a striking and frighteningly real story of a family fighting for survival that will make everyone stop and think about what kind of planet we are leaving behind for our children." Benedict Cumberbatch"An exceptional, alarming and beautiful book, which still echoes months after I finished reading it. Megan Hunter is a writer of unnerving power." Evie Wyld, author of All the Birds, Singing"Spellbinding . . . a slender novel, but more profoundly moving than novels six times as long. It is perfectly balanced between fear and wonder. The world around them may be falling apart in the most extraordinary way, but ordinary life goes on and, as Hunter makes us understand, what a beautiful life it is." The Bookseller"I can't remember ever having read a novel quite as sparing or as daring as Megan Hunter's The End We Start From, or one that delivers so mighty an impact from such delicate materials. It is a moving, wistful and compelling debut." Jim Crace, author of Harvest"A beautifully spare, haunting meditation on the persistence of life after catastrophe. I loved it." Emily St. John Mandel, author of Station Eleven"Megan Hunter's prose is exquisite, her depiction of a world descending into chaos is frighteningly real, and yet, it is her portrayal of motherhood - that tender-terrifying experience of bringing a child into a world - that has remained with me ... an incredible, original exploration of all that beauty, boredom and bewilderment. I read it in one sitting, and was deeply moved." Hannah Kent, author of Burial Rites and The Good People"Exceptional, stunning. I devoured it" Megan Bradbury, author of Everyone is Watching"A dystopia that feels utterly convincing as our narrator gives birth to her son in a London under threat of advancing flood waters. She lives in the gulp zone so must head off into a familiar territory that has become terrifying in search of shelter and safety. This slender take on new motherhood has stayed with me - not least in making me think about the UK as a place to flee from rather than to, and to imagine Londoners turned refugees" Stylist"I was moved, terrified, uplifted - sometimes all three at once" Tracy Chevalier, author of Girl With a Pearl Earring

Amy Buckle

The End We Start From is a piece of impactful dystopian fiction which sees a family thrown into the unknown when London, and the surrounding areas are flooded and they must flee. Having just given birth to her first child, the narrator must work out how to keep... read the full review here: https://www.amybucklesbookshelf.co.uk...

The End We Start From

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