Rating: **** (4/5)
Published: Knopf, November 2019
Format: ARC
Genre: Historical Fiction
Source: Amazon Vine
This book had me fooled at first! I wasn’t expecting a post-apocalyptic story, considering the summary said it took place in 1468. It certainly had a medieval atmosphere to it, but then I caught hints in the first few chapters like tobacco use and the abundance of clocks. It wasn’t until our main character discovered “artifacts” that included plastic and an iPhone that I realized something cataclysmic had occurred to send the world back into the dark ages.
The aforementioned character is a priest named Fairfax who has been dispatched to a remote village by his bishop to bury the local parson. What he was not expecting was that the deceased was obsessed with the past and what occurred before Armageddon. This new era began more than 800 years ago when they reset the calendar to year 666 after the world experienced an apocalypse-like devastation in 2025. I know, it’s a bit to wrap one’s head around, but Harris delivers the premise so expertly. As Fairfax delves into the heretical world of pre-Armageddon, he gets sucked into a mystery that utterly consumes him. While Harris never divulges the exact cause of the great catastrophe, he gives us fascinating clues. “And we also know that almost every person including children, was issued a device that enabled them to see and hear one another, however far apart in the world they might be; that these devices were small enough to be carried in the palm of one’s hand; that they gave instant access to all the knowledge and music and opinions and writings in the world; and that in due course they displaced human memory and reasoning and even normal social intercourse – an enfeebling and narcotic power that some say drove their possessors mad, to the extent that their introduction marked the beginning of the end of advanced civilisation.” This was an idea met with incredulity by the people living in 1468.
So the time that Fairfax lives in is devoid of electricity and modern conveniences, is ruled by the church, and it is illegal to even discuss the pre-Armageddon era, let alone search for or own artifacts from before 666. The more he learns, the more Fairfax is intrigued by the dangerous past. Really, this was such a unique book and a captivating idea. I’ll even forgive it for having a somewhat ambiguous conclusion because Harris has skills in creating foreboding atmosphere and life-like characters.
I received a complimentary copy of this book via the Amazon Vine program.
JulzReads 