A Song for the End of the World: Book Review

I just finished reading A Song for the End of the World by Jason Fuhrman. Jason is a youtuber and someone I know (through discord, at least. Haha). As such, it should go without saying that I have biases at play here. I could go on about how I won't let any biases creep in, etc., etc. But let's be real: when have you ever believed someone when they've said something along those lines? I never have. I am biased, and I am obviously a bit uncomfortable about it. I also know that psychological research has shown that when our feet are held to the fire, and we are obligated to provide examples to bolster our reasoning, biases tend to disappear. As such, I will start with a vague spoiler free summary on my views, followed by a more in-depth spoiler discussion.

I should also mention that I am waiting to watch the conversation between Britton and Jason because I want this to be my reaction to the book itself with little influence from the outside.

Overall (No Spoilers)

Overall, I enjoyed the story. At the same time, I think I am going through a serious reading slump. I really have to take a break or try other strategies, because it took me quite some time to get through this book. The reading slump applied to other books that I was or am reading, so I am not convinced that this is something specific to this book. For example, I couldn't even get through The Vorrh, another book I was reading at the time. And I am currently reading Fight Club, something that I am really enjoying—but I'm still pushing through the book at essentially a chapter a day; if you have read the book, you know that's rather pathetic for a reading pace, lol. This might just be my bias that I mentioned above, but that's kind of the point of me bringing this up in the first place. Maybe it is.

The primary thing that I enjoyed in this book is the characters. I have mentioned many times before that generally "unlikeable" characters are probably my favorite kind of character. Unapologetic flaws and characters who often do horrible things are basically catnip. There is a reason The First Law was one of the main character writing influences in my own book. The honesty and the intrinsic appeal of looking into the flawed hearts of people is probably the greatest appeal of any story. Jason's characters all show these kinds of flaws, especially the main character, Mia. Perhaps the one exception would be Isla, but that is only because of her child-like nature. I especially liked Mia's and her mother's interactions, with Mia's attitude fluctuating like the weather patterns. There is especially one sequence where Mia actually brings out something in her mother that showed the kind of story we were getting.

Next, I want to comment on the prose of the story. This was something that I was mixed on, overall. On one hand, I thought that the prose was exceptional. There were passages in this book that stood out to me, and the book overall was poetic and creative with how the story was communicated. This book escapes the usual stereotypes associated with self-published books. With Daniel Greene, it was obvious that the story was written by a novice, with the clunky dialogue and description that too often becomes repetitive or unimaginative. It's also obvious when the author is too principled in their attachment to a few pieces of writing advice they learned from some book or video. Jason's prose is better than many published authors, even, and it's hardly surprising, given the focus he gives to the "cinematography of the novel" whenever he reviews books. I think it's the main reason I subscribed and joined the discord. You can usually predict the quality of someone's writing based on how they review the book: how specific are the criticisms?

At the same time, I often found the prose of the novel to be a bit too poetic, in terms of the metaphors. The book was nowhere near as frustrating as The Vorrh, which drove me to DNF it, or as terrifying as Bakker, which taught me what to scale back or outright avoid in my own prose. Even still, there were parts of the book that had to read over a couple times. I sometimes confused myself over whether a metaphor was literal, and I'm still wondering if I understood it all that well. Further, the plot progression was hard to understand in places, and this is downstream of the metaphors.

I think the reason I could appreciate Bakker despite the occasionally excessive prose was the surrounding plot. I am a sucker for complex plots, and the deep philosophical discussions are another thing that I could grasp onto. Jason has mentioned in videos and on the discord that he cares less for plot, especially compared to characters, and this is reflected in this story. The plot is not that interesting in its own right.

The ending was alright for me. The overall idea was a bittersweet ending compared to the rest of the story. I'm not sure I appreciated the execution of the ending, however. I just got the sense that the ending was shoehorned in, in those last few sentences. I'm also not sure if this is the absolute ending. The book's end notes suggested that there was more to the story, but I also thought I saw Jason mention multiple times that he no longer wanted a series. I found myself assuming that this was all there was to the story.

Overall, I liked the book for the characters and their relationships, and the overall prose. At the same time, the prose was sometimes too metaphorical, and the plot wasn't that interesting. I think I will give the book a 7/10.

Overall (Spoilers)

Characters

Probably my favorite character moment in the entire book is after Mia and her mother are reunited and they are taken to a place by a man. Mia has already callously dismissed her mother as being weak, and all because her mother was gang raped. Her mother wants nothing more than to help her, in the beginning. But then Mia is physically hurt by the man (more on this later). And the mother says to her: "'Just one,' [...] 'He is just one. How far did you get? Hmm? I hope you understand now. I hope you listen. I hope—'" But she cuts herself off, turning white.

This was a perfect portrayal of a mother letting her temporary frustrations get the better of her. She had fought, and she continues to fight, for her daughter—even in spite of her daughter's cruel disregard for the suffering she had endured. But even then, she is flawed. She lets that frustration break through, and for reasons that you can understand, even if you don't agree with it. Seeing characters do the unforgivable, especially as a believable break in character, is the best kind of writing.

Mia's irrational fluctuations between outright hatred of her mother to a gushing love in the matter of seconds was the perfect depiction of an angry child, though I'll admit that I thought Mia was in her early teens, rather than only ten years old. (I don't think that really matters, though). Much of Mia's reactions seem to be borne of a feeling of betrayal, where her mother's inadequacy made her resent the woman. The problem was that Mia was not worldly enough to grasp the sheer brutality and futility of world and the situation.

The mother's commitment throughout it all provided one of the few kernels of hope that underlies the crushing atmosphere. It reminds me of the Berserk Manga and the overall atmosphere of that story.

Isla's character was less interesting to me, though there were certainly some aspects that I liked. Because of how I structured this review, let me start with the negatives. I'll have to admit that I did not think Isla's character mattered all that much to the story. Was there really a point to having the story told from her perspective? I honestly do not have a straightforward answer to this question. Isla's purpose in the story is the question of whether Mia is able to get back to her and save her from the general harshness of the world. As such, Isla's POVs don't really do much for the plot of the story. Jason could have gotten away with removing her from the story entirely, making her just a plot device in the background; maybe a few flashbacks from Mia's perspective could have been added to help develop her and make her something worth going after.

This is not to say that there was nothing to having a perspective for Isla. Despite what I mentioned above, I thought the way that Jason executed the prose from Isla's perspective was done very well. I'll have criticisms of his use of metaphor below, but it is worth mentioning that with Isla, the idea worked well for her character. She was raised basically her whole life in a shelter, and that shelter was essentially her entire world. Her concept of cities and the ocean and what is "miles away" are all distorted by these circumstances. A lesser writer would have simply mentioned her limited perspective and thrown in a few twists in the descriptions to reflect that, but Jason baked the perspective into the very prose, making it feel all encompassing.

Prose

This leads into the next section.

I mentioned that I liked the prose overall, so I want to go through some examples to build off that point:

"The earth heaved, knocking Mia's feet off the ladder. She hung there with a one-handed grip on the hatch as the ladder clattered to the floor. Her five-fingered hold became four, then three, then two—"

This is a rather straightforward example of a description of action in the book, but I think it captures a certain quality that I really appreciate. Firstly, that the description is grounded within a perspective. "The earth heaved" reflects how this is what Mia perceives. But alongside this, I liked the poetic use of repetition in the description—"Her five-fingered hold became four, then three, then two"—that brings out a feeling of progression.

A writer with less care for prose, or less experience, might have written something like this: "Mia's legs flew out from under her. She was left hanging by one hand, praying her grip would hold. But it continued to slip away." Descriptions like this are workman-like and lack the flourish that you can see above.

Another quick example that I have to mention would be this: "Two glossy reflections locked on to her. Two bright green eyes. Striated with gold, they followed her movements, would disappear, then reappear. A blink."

While I like the prose and thought it was much better than most self-published work and most traditionally published work, too, there were some problems worth mentioning: the confusing nature of some sections. I won't say that every section of the story was confusing, but it happened enough that I noticed.

On one hand, it seems obvious that this was intentional in certain places. When Mia started interacting with the child/monster, the confusion over what this thing was is understandable both for the character in story and for the author making writing decisions. Even then, I still don't understand what the child monster was, now that I have finished the story. I still don't understand if Mia was just exaggerating the cleft lip of an innocent child or if it genuinely was a creepy supernatural presence in the story. Further, I don't understand the point of the character. There was a part where the creature showed that it knew a song, something that it ought not know, but I don't remember any answer being given for this. Maybe that was the point, and maybe there really is more to the story overall, but at this point I don't really see the point of including this at all.

I also was rather confused about the scene I briefly mentioned above when I was talking about the relationship between Mia and her mother. I mentioned that Mia was "physically hurt by the man." This is because I didn't really understand what happened. The way the mother reacted seemed to imply that she was raped, or maybe she was just referring to how Mia couldn't fight back. I don't know. But the story seemed to imply that she wasn't actually raped, perhaps because of Mia's personal bias. Unfortunately, I don't have the quotes on hand; I just remember constantly second-guessing myself as the story continued.

A final example of metaphor going a bit too far was in chapter 17, when Isla seemed to be imagining herself on a boat. My initial impression was that she was being carried while in the rain, and the movements resembled that of being in a boat. But then the description talked about her going overboard and being overtaken by the sea; this obviously implies that these perceived metaphors were meant to be literal. I was just confused. I don't know.

I don't think that metaphor is bad in prose altogether, I just think there has to be some balance. There might not be one true way to address this problem, but the general idea from me would be to try and move back and forth between concrete and metaphorical description so that the readers have some foothold. If the character is delusional, then the delusion could be communicated in concrete language, only to have that undercut by the progression of events. In this case, the metaphor would mainly be an aesthetic, rather than a tool for communicating confusion. This is probably too simplistic, but it's something I thought of while reading.

I also occasionally wonder about the degree to which my own writing reflects this. It's easy to forget how confusing your writing might be to others, when you are the one who wrote it and therefore know what it means from the outset. Who knows?

Conclusion

Overall, I liked the book for the characters and their relationships, and the overall prose. At the same time, the prose was sometimes too metaphorical, and the plot wasn't that interesting. I think I will give the book a 7/10.