Manon Steffan Ros

#ReadAroundTheWorld. #Wales

This 2023 Carnegie Medal winner is a YA post-apocalyptic dystopian sci-fi, set near Anglesey in Wales, after a nuclear disaster known as “The End.” The novel is written by Welsh author Manon Steffan Ros and has been translated from Welsh.

After the nuclear disaster all technology has disappeared and Rowenna, her son Dylan, and baby daughter Mona (Sión and Dwynwen in the original Welsh story) must learn how to go back to basics to survive. In their isolated rural cottage young Dylan learns to become a handyman and producer of food and Rowenna learns to overcome her sensibilities and forage. He and his mother take turns in recording their thoughts and secrets in a diary they name the Blue Book of Nebo. They both immerse themselves in their love of literature and develop a love for the Welsh language.

This was a gentle, beautiful read that I highly recommend. The audiobook is read by the author herself, and I enjoyed the lilting Welsh accent. It made me wish I could read Welsh.… (mehr)

At first, the news were not that alarming - bombs went off in American cities. For Rowenna and her son Dylan, tucked in rural Wales, this is half a world away - although she was worried enough to go and buy all the food she could. Then the power went off and never came back. Then the local power plant (or something in that direction) went up and the clouds brought radiation sickness. But this is not where this book starts. That was all in the past, in 2018, when Dylan was 6, when The End came. Now he is 14 and for the last 8 years he had lived with his mother in their isolated house - never meeting anyone besides the neighbors who left in the first months of the new world. For all he knows, the two of them are the last people on Earth (well, not exactly - because there is Mona, his 2 years old sister and he learned a few months ago that that would have required at least one more person to be alive. But he will never ask - because when his mother does not like a question, she closes up - and that hurts).

If one knows anything about Welsh legends, they would recognize what the title of the book is playing on - the Red Book of Hergest and the Black Book of Carmarthen preserved enough of the legends in the same way this book preserves the chronicles of these times (if you do not recognize the reference, Dylan will tell you pretty early in the books). The first chapter starts with Dylan telling us how they found the notebook he is now writing in -- because this whole book is a diary, written by two people - Rowenna and Dylan. Early on, he writes about their now-and-here, she writes about the past - including The End. But that division soon melts away and both of them write about whatever they feel like writing about. And that's how we finally learn what happened - although we never get the full picture - Rowenna never knew the bigger story so we never do either. It is a story of survival and finding the will to continue, to preserve your life. But somewhere in there is also a love song for the Welsh language and literature - because when she is sure that everything is over, Rowenna saves books, despite not being a big reader) - both in English and in Welsh. She even learns to love again her mother tongue - she was reared up speaking Welsh but she stopped using it because her teachers wanted the book Welsh and hers was the lived-in version so she just gave up. The book is full if these almost randomly thrown ideas which make you think about the world we live in.

The short novel (novella really) is heartbreaking at times although in a few places it felt forced - the author was looking for the emotion instead of letting the prose elicit it. And the end managed to surprise me - if I knew it was coming, I would have thought of it was a hopeful end but reading it at the end of the story, it felt like a nightmare made real. I had to stop and think of my reaction to it - it did nor make any sense on the surface. And yet it does - because the story turns on its head the concept of what is normal and good - and makes you wonder if the world we live in is really worth saving if it gets to that.

It is a depressing book on so many levels. The story of survival, of a child growing into an adult overnight and of a mother, who even in that world finds a way to punish is not always an easy read (not that Rowenna is a bad mother but she is a person and getting stuck with someone who depends on you, seeing that someone grow up long before his time takes its toll). But at the same time it is a not so bad way to make the reader look into their own life and figure out what is really important. And to make you slow down and appreciate what you have.

The story's style is deceptively easy - as all of it is written by a boy who learned his language from books and from a woman who never wrote anything since school (and was not a big reader either). So there is some simplicity in the language which may make the whole narrative sound almost shallow. I do not know how that sounded in Welsh but as the book was translated into English by the author, I assume that this was intentional (although I am not that sure about the places where it seemed to slip a bit). But that language sells the story even more than the narrative does - because it fits, you can imagine both Rowenna and her son and you wonder if you could have survived if that happened to you. And when a book makes you think that way, the book did its job (even if it has issues and is not perfect).… (mehr)