Saturday, December 7, 2019

Greta and Maja


reviewed by Dave Gorin in South Africa
December 5, 2019

Gentle but disturbing dystopian fiction: The End of the Ocean by Norwegian novelist Maja Lunde (pubished in 2019)

Which is more powerful: provocation or the pen?

Greta Thunberg’s dynamic, youthful activism must be admired. Maja Lunde may be her literary equivalent, persuasively pushing looming environmental disasters into our consciousness using imagination and narrative.

Lunde’s follow up to her award-winning History of Bees continues the climate change dystopia, set in a not-too-distant future when our actions today have unravelled into dire consequences for future generations.

This is creditable cli-fi because its projection is wrapped within contextual realism and a believable story; the characters could be many of us, and the circumstances — especially involving water stress issues — are happening right now.

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