The Book of M
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The Book of M
Buy Now for £19.04
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Narrated by:
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James Fouhey
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Emily Woo Zeller
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By:
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Peng Shepherd
About this listen
Set in a dangerous near future world, The Book of M tells the captivating story of ordinary people caught in an extraordinary catastrophe, risking everything to save the ones they love.
In the middle of a market in India, a man’s shadow disappears. This mysterious phenomenon spreads like a plague, and while those afflicted gain a strange new power, it comes at a horrible price: the loss of all their memories.
Two years later, Ory and Max have escaped the Forgetting by hiding in an abandoned hotel deep in the woods. Their new life feels almost normal, until one day Max’s shadow disappears.
Knowing that her condition makes her dangerous, Max runs away. But Ory refuses to give up the time they have left together. Desperate to find Max before her memories disappear, he sets out into a perilous, unrecognizable world.
Critic reviews
‘Ambitious road-trip epic… a moving treatise on love and loss, with the bonus of a stunning denouement’
GUARDIAN
‘Peng Shepherd’s debut novel is the real deal…a meditation on memories and personhood’
ELLE
‘Graceful and riveting’
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
‘I was both disturbed and inspired by Max’s and Ory’s journey through apocalypses large and small. Peng Shepherd has written a prescient, dark fable for the now and for the soon-to-be. THE BOOK OF M is our beautiful nightmare shadow’
Paul Tremblay, author of A HEAD FULL OF GHOSTS and THE CABIN AT THE END OF THE WORLD
‘A voice that's as emotionally compelling as GONE GIRL, a novel that's as thrilling as THE STAND. Prepare to fall in love with your own shadow. And to lose sleep’
David Lipsky, New York Times best-selling author of ALTHOUGH OF COURSE YOU END UP BECOMING YOURSELF and ABSOLUTELY AMERICAN
‘THE BOOK OF M is exciting, imaginative, unique, and beautiful. Shepherd proves herself not just a writer to watch, but a writer to treasure’
Darin Strauss, bestselling author of HALF A LIFE
We follow Ory and his quest to find his wife, Max, after her shadow disappears. She leaves to protect him. There are also two other main characters whose stories we follow - an olympic trained archer and the Amnesiac.
I loved this. The narrators were excellent, and for such an implausible concept, it just seemed so likely! For a book with magic, it didn't seem wildly fantastical. Why SHOULDN'T this happen? It makes a change from a killer virus (for the record, I like those kinds of stories too, by the way). I really liked the descriptions of those who lost their memories - the way in which it happened sounded a bit like I would imagine those with Alzheimers or dementia lose their memories. This book is about how important our memories actually are, how they shape the way we live our lives.
A very good book/ listen!
Very enjoyable
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Then... my questions that would be answered were answered in the first-quarter.
The vast majority of the book felt like a generic post-apocalyptic fantasy. One faction could have been zombies, I thought.
In the middle, characters go between places, join warring groups, fight, get ambushed, fight some more, kill lots of people, and then finally there is a big battle: a quick battle that even the author doesn't seem particularly interested in, because the point is the plot twist in the last hour.
And it's a good plot twist. I didn't expect it. And it really worked for me. I nearly gave up well before. I'm glad I didn't.
So I found the book in some ways among the best I've listened to this year. But too often a soggy biscuit. Some bits of writing I found clunky. And some events seemed off (in a story with magic I guess everything is okay because, um magic, but some things felt 'thin', not thought through – as if something was just said for the purpose of one sentence).
So overall I'm giving it 3/5, but imho it earns both 5/5 and 1/5.
I don't think it's any coincidence that the favourable reviews I saw refer to the first and last bit. If you steam through the middle, or just love spending time in a post-apocalyptic violent factional world ;), I can see how this may be a big winner for you. It was a mixed bag for me.
A book at both extremes
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Amazing!
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Save your money!!!
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