Publisher: 27th October 2021 by Hachette Australia
Pages: 341 pages
How I Read It: ARC book
Genre: thriller
My Rating: 5 cups
Synopsis:
Award-winning novelist and nature writer Inga Simpson terrifies and enthralls with this truly remarkable novel of a woman who must face her worst fears to survive and find beauty in a world under attack.
Fear is her cage. But what's outside is worse...
It's night, and dust swirls against the walls of Rachel's home in the Australian bush. Her fear of other people has led her to a reclusive life as far from them as possible, her only occasional contact with her sister.
A hammering on the door. There stand a mother, Hannah, and her sick baby. They are running for their lives from a mysterious death sweeping the Australian countryside - so soon, too soon, after everything.
Now Rachel must face her worst fears to help Hannah, search for her sister, and discover just what terror was born of us. . . and how to survive it.
For fans of BIRDBOX and A QUIET PLACE, this remarkable, terrifying literary horror thriller holds a mirror up to the changed world we live in today.
My Thoughts
‘The threats to human existence has always been imagined as coming from the outside: beings from outer space, asteroids, contagion loosed from the jungle.
‘What if we did this to ourselves?’
The Last Woman in the World is a book for our times. It is clever and compelling - a definite must read for all futuristic thriller fans. After the summer fires, after the virus … comes a story like this! It is contemporary and contemplative and is sure to generate much discussion, not only due to the timely topical issues, but delving deeper to appreciate what Inga has to say about how we treat each other and our world.
‘Fears had once been hidden, private. Only revealed in glimpses, a momentary loss of control or within the safety of intimacy. Now they had all escaped onto the surface.’
This book is a quiet reckoning not to be ignored. I am not usually a fan of the thriller genre but the synopsis spoke to me and I am ever so glad I listened. With Inga’s clever and powerful prose to reel you in, you will be on the edge of your seat with some shockingly personal and profound events and revelations. It was difficult to put this book down at times.
‘She should have shut it down sooner. The constant stream of information, feeding her anxieties. In the end it had shut her down. Her mind stopped functioning, then her body, alone inside that locked apartment. And now they were trying to do it all over again.’
The pacing is spot on. The characterisation is captivating. The plot is chilling … terrifyingly so with Inga placing you at the heart of the consequences of an ‘end of the world’ scenario. Set in Australia’s capital, Canberra, many Australians will empathise with the frightening fires, or remonstrate with how matters are handled when society as you know it is crumbling.
‘It was a world gone silent. Silenced. There was no news. No help. No advice. No solution.’
Inga Simpson is to be congratulated on penning a tale for our times - a dynamic and confronting futuristic story that is sure to captivate its readers. I highly recommend The Last Woman in the World.
‘Maybe that explained the ache in Rachel’s own chest. As if she was picking up the pain of the land itself. The tipping point, when it came, had been so quick. For the decade Rachel had been hidden away, she had minimised her footprint - done no harm - but she had not helped, either. And now it was too late. Isaiah, if he survived, would never see half the things she had seen, taken for granted, gulped down.’
This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.
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