Griz's family lives on a little island in the Outer Hebrides, on a mostly depopulated Earth. Over a century before, something unknown, but referred to as the Gelding, caused the human reproduction rate to plummet to almost nothing. Griz's ancestors were among those who, as the population crashed, moved to remote areas where they wouldn't meet other people accidentally. The family consists of Griz, Griz's parents, and brother and sister Ferg and Bar. There was another sister, Joy, not much older than Griz, who is the youngest..Griz tells us the heartbreaking story of his sister Joy chasing a kite that got loose, and accidentally tumbling over the cliff.
Between the rocks and the powerful surf, she couldn't survive, and they could never recover her body.
One day, a ship with red sails arrives in their little harbor, carrying a man called Brand, who says he wants to trade. Brand, we soon learn, is a charmer, a storyteller, a liar, and a thief.
This is where our story really starts, and it's a story told entirely, with one small exception near the end, from Griz's viewpoint, in a notebook that he carries with him.
Brand adds color, fun, and a little news to the day, because strangers showing up is the only way to learn of what's happening away from their own island and their near neighbors, the Lewismen, on a nearby island. They all like Brand, and there is much talk about trading--but one of the things Brand wants to trade for is one of Griz's own two dogs, two small terriers called Jip and Jess. Brand wants Jess, because Jess is female, and dogs Gmuch as humans have dramatically collapsed in numbers. Griz says no. Everyone else says Jess is Griz's, and Griz won't give her up, ever.
Brand laughs it off.
Brand is invited to join them for dinner, and he brings his own contribution, something they've never had before, that he picked up in Spain--marmalade. They all eat and enjoy it, but Griz broke a tooth the day before, and the sweetness is too much for that broken tooth. Griz eats less than anyone else. Griz wakes up before everyone else, too--to find Brand is leaving, and all of Griz's family is sleeping very very deeply. He struggles to wake them, fearing they may not, and when his father is awake, they discover how much Brand has stolen, including all the fish they would have been both eating and trading in the coming weeks.
And Jess. Jip is still present, but Jess is gone. And Griz sees Brand's red sails just about to disappear over the horizon. Jip and Griz quickly set off in the sailboat Sweethope, Griz's own boat, following Brand.
What follows is a hard chase, with stops at places Griz never knew of, or had only read of in books gathered from "viking" abandoned towns and scattered abandoned buildings. There are several encounters with Brand, who proves to be in some ways cultured and educated, and who keeps insisting that Jess is his because he stole her, that he's not a monster, and that Griz, with no trace of beard at all, is obviously too young to be pursuing him, and needs to turn around and go home. He also tells Griz, repeatedly, that he's not a monster, a claim that Griz has good reason to doubt.
Griz continues the pursuit, and learns a great deal about the way the world has changed. Harrowing encounters included an encounter with wild pigs, that he wouldn't have survived except for the chance arrival of a French woman who says her name is "John Dark," or something that sounds like that. Griz does mention in passing, in the notebook he carries, that that's not what she really said, but what she really said was no more her real name than "John Dark," but it was a good name and what she chose to be called.
We see a depopulated England, and life (other than human) prevailing, and find both terrible and wonderful things, such as the Homely House. There are disturbing remnants of how people chose to face the end of their world, and some of the ways people are choosing to survive are disturbing too.
All along the way, there are secrets to be discovered, and secrets to be revealed. including Griz's own. Griz also finds a lot to think about, how dogs have been with humans from the beginning, and were betrayed by humans in the end. We learn about the Freemen, who apparently maintained underground, electronic brains--as long as possible, until the last people who knew how died. And now, at least some of the Freeman are spreading la peste, the plague, the actual plague.
I mentioned that Griz has a secret, but there's also another, major, secret, very important to Griz, that needs to be discovered.
This was a slow read for me, because it's a post-apocalyptic novel, of exactly the kind I don't enjoy nearly so much as when I was a teenager living through the Cold War. (Okay, yes, the Cold War may be back again, but I no longer want to focus on the aftermath of it going hot in some way when I'm reading for leisure.) But this one was recommended by a friend, whose judgment on this I trust, and the trust was not misplaced. Even though I took a few breaks, I kept returning to it, because, yes, it's worth it.
Also, all dogs encountered in the course of the book are alive and well at the end. Yes, that's something I require, to consider a book readable.
Recommended.
I bought this book.
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Popular Highlights in this book
Forgetting is a kind of betrayal, even if it’s what happens to all grief. Time wears everything smoother as it grinds past, I suppose.Highlighted by 380 Kindle readers- You can fall out of your own safe life that quickly, and nothing you thought you knew will ever be the same again.Highlighted by 357 Kindle readers
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About the author
Your dog is stolen AND it’s the end of the world?
“A man stole my dog. I went after him. Bad things happened. I can never go home.” I was pulled straight into this simple yet riveting declaration by Griz, our stoical narrator. How could it not resonate with anyone who has opened his heart to a dog? I don’t even want to imagine what I might be capable of doing to a man who stole a piece of my soul. Rather than dwell upon that distressing hypothetical, I read on eagerly, straight into Fletcher’s tale and hellbent on vicarious retribution. “Of all the animals that travelled the long road through the ages with us, dogs always walked closest.” Owing to most all pups in a litter being male, Griz contemplates the Gelding, Earth’s “soft apocalypse,” noting that very few bitches are born anymore. “Maybe that’s a downside for the dogs, punishment for their loyalty, some cosmically unfair collateral damage for walking alongside us all those centuries.” As unfair as it is to the canines, the Gelding hit the human population even harder, rendering their reproduction to unbelievably low levels estimated at one in a million. Griz hasn’t even met enough people in his lifetime to make up a proper game of football. He and his family live alone on an island with their dogs, leaving as necessary for food and other resources. Along with his father, mother, brother, and sister, Griz will sail to other lands for seasonal foods and wildlife, occasionally turning up books which they revere and treasure. Reading helps them to survive, to learn their origins, and to know how they came to be where they are. Their value is not lost on Griz who shares that opening the front cover of a new book is like a door allowing him to travel far away in place and time, where even the wide sea and the open sky can be claustrophobic if you never get away from them. Having read only the first six chapters provided, I’d rate this at 4.5 stars. I enjoyed the refreshing hike away from urban dystopia, rioting for for resources, and post-apocalyptic hierarchical power struggles. The writing style is casual and accessible, moving at that lovely steady pace where boredom is not an issue and there is a yearning for each next page. Character development is tough to gauge so early in the book, but with such significance placed in dogs and books by Griz, it’d be hard to go wrong. I’d love the opportunity to read through to the end! Thanks to NetGalley, Orbit Books, and author Charlie Fletcher for providing the first six chapters of A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World in exchange for an honest review!
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on March 18, 2022
- Reviewed in the United States on July 30, 2019
Top reviews from other countries
- Cliente AmazonReviewed in Spain on November 10, 2019
Absolutely loved this book!!!
- AmazonKundeReviewed in Germany on November 9, 2020
great story with two unexpected twists
- JojomamanReviewed in the United Kingdom on June 22, 2019
I’d give this TEN STARS if I could! Best book I’ve read this year!
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