The New Wilderness audiobook

Gripping, fierce, terrifying examination of what people are capable of when they want to survive in both the best and worst ways. Loved this.

This is dark, wild, earth shattering, mind spinning, WTH I just read, I need a big break to gather my feelings kind of book! This is quiet dazzling, thought provoking, unique, depressing, apocalyptic, soul crushing dystopian read is not for everyone! I feel like my head can explode at any second after too much pressure, high tension, after reading dark portrait of future with painful mother-daughter’s survival story.Impressive and emotional mother-daughter bounding and heart-wrenching journey they find themselves to test their devoted relationship during the climate change, living in the Wilderness and witnessing the human’s mental and physical struggles to survive. Welcome to Wilderness! As the smog and pollution covers the metropolis and destroys its citizens’ lungs, 20 people become volunteers for the study including Bea, her husband Glen, an important academician and their daughter Agnes. The rules are defined strictly by the Rangers: they have to play nice, do what they’re told. Unless… You don’t want to think it through.They called themselves community and learned how to use arrow and bow to hunt, achieve struggling tasks to adapt their lives in environment, sharpen their negotiation skills to survive. Rules are obvious: You shouldn’t stay at the same place more than seven days and you shouldn’t leave trace. But as the environment and the circumstances surrounded them bring out the caged animals hid inside the human nature, Bea realizes she has to do something to save her daughter. She cannot live with these conditions.The changing of community volunteers become so threatening at each day and so many waitlisted refugees called Newcomers start to arrive the city, Bea notices the time is ticking. The city people turn into savages who may do whatever it takes to earn their freedom.Overall: This is original, well-written, disturbing journey I mostly enjoyed but I have to emphasize: this journey is not for everyone. You need to prepare yourself to be challenged psychologically. It’s consuming, intense story for the true lovers of bleak future dystopian stories.Special thanks to NetGalley and Harper Collins Publishers for sharing this remarkable ARC in exchange my honest review.bloginstagramfacebooktwitter

The New Wilderness is an eco thriller/dystopian regarding climate change and overpopulation.About the book: Helen Phillips meets Miranda July in this daring and imaginative debut novel that explores a moving mother-daughter relationship in a world ravaged by climate change and overpopulation, a suspenseful second book from the author of the acclaimed story collection, Man V. Nature.My thoughts: This book is hard to describe other than to tell you it’s exciting and unlike anything else I’ve ever read. The future is dark, very dark, and feels vividly real. The book took over my life while I was reading it. I couldn’t put it down, and when I did, I was constantly thinking about it. Could it happen? Would it happen? It’s full of emotion and beautifully-written. I’ve not read Man V. Nature, but I desperately want to now.I received a gifted copy. All opinions are my own.Many of my reviews can also be found on my blog: www.jennifertarheelreader.com and instagram: www.instagram.com/tarheelreader

Even better than Man V. Nature.

I am not the only avid reader that has become somewhat exhausted with the genre of dystopian fiction. There are still really thoughtful and unique contributions to that kind of literature, but the prospect of climate catastrophe and inchoate fascism at the doorstep makes reading about the end game of our trajectory less appealing. Yet with the Booker Prize longlisting the debut novel of Diane Cook, The New Wilderness, I was compelled to throw myself into the thick of a world, not that different than ours, imperiled and expiring. It was a bit of a rough start, a slow introduction to a group of pioneers of sorts choosing to leave the growing poisonous cities to fine requiem in the midst of a wild, unpopulated small tract of land. Modern amenities useless, the small community quickly adapted to past ways of survival, resorting to hunting without guns, foraging without agriculture, nomadic instead of stable. Although we had not arrived here by way of natural disaster or plague, the setting still felt somewhat derivative to the likes of Station Eleven, with Emily St. John Mandel ironically blurbing the book. But there is a shift at some point. Without giving away spoilers, Cook decides to dive deeply into the idea of motherhood and its significance in a world where familial relations are loose or crumbling. The two central characters, Bea and Agnes, mother and daughter, are the perspectives that shape our understanding in this world, and while survival is an ever present constant, it is the relationship they have with one another and their feelings about being mother and daughter that shape their desires and actions. There are bumpy moments at the beginning, I was not immediately captured by the voice of Bea, who provides the initial eyes into this world. But as I slowly grew accustomed to the pacing and plotting and the prose that felt accessible but definitely not sparse or pedestrian, I became entranced by the questions Cook is trying to grapple with. How would familial bonds, that appear so universal as motherhood, react to a world where the threads of those bonds grew weak and challenged by other loyalities, other relationships that became more important. How would those still placing meaning to familial bonds react to the changes to these social relationships that no longer carry the same importance? How would ideas and concepts of motherhood transform as the basic structures of society broke down?I truly appreciate when fiction becomes a tool to explore larger questions of the human experience and although it doesn't always work in other books, The New Wilderness manages to pull it off. It is an engrossing read, beautifully written, well plotted, and with this huge injection of thematic considerations that don't feel forced.

One of the literary awards that I religiously follow every year is the Man Booker Prize which is in my opinion the only literary prize that accumulates the best of the best literature that comes out every year. Literature that is not lazy but striking and timelessly beautiful. The New Wilderness by Diane Cook has been longlisted for The Man Booker Prize this year and when I tell you that this book is a force of a story I’m not lying to you. Set in the near future, this novel introduces readers to a haunting world that is not so hard to imagine. A world where breathing fresh air is a thing of the past unless you have been chosen to be apart of this new experiment that studies how humans interact with nature in the last bit of “Wilderness” left. Mostly following Bea who becomes involved with this experiment in order to save her daughter, Agnes, from the toxic pollution, the reader is immersed right from the first page into this Wilderness that is extraordinary but equally claustrophobic for those who are involved. What Cook has managed to do with this book is to give an examination of not only survival but this long lost relationship that humans have had with nature. I want to call this a sixth sense that is embedded in our human species. One can feel this through the way these characters interact within this new space. Their way of moving is different, their way of feeling is different, their way of thinking is different; it is a new language that feels strangely animalistic but so human. Where Cook excels at is with these astonishing passages that describe nature in the most beautiful way. One gets lost in this imagery which gives life to this story. Additionally, this book is incredibly researched by giving readers a look into a future that remembers humans in its early stages. It answers this question of, what was humanity like when all it knew was this sublime but dangerous wilderness? The New Wilderness by Diane Cook is a powerful work of fiction that I highly recommend. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone finished this 400-page book in one day because it is that intense and immersing. I completely loved everything about it and I was devastated that I finished so early. One of my favorite books of 2020 periodttttttt.

Yes, this is a book about life on the land in a dystopian future. But really, mostly, it's a book about mothers and daughters. When you take away all the trappings of daily life and take it down to just survival in a small group, all the ways in which the needs of one and the needs of the other conflict are suddenly bright and harsh. It is often not the case that what is best for the child is best for the parent, and vice versa. And when everything you do is seen, when it is impossible to take space, a relationship can become deeply comlpicated.At the end, while I really enjoyed the wilderness world Cook built and the way she brought it to life, it is the story of Bea and Agnes that really sticks with you. Yes, Bea wants to protect her daughter, but in such a harsh world how to do that is a vastly different question than the one we're used to. Agnes relies on her mother, but growing up in such a different place than her mother did means they are inevitably going to see the world in utterly different ways. Their problems may not be all that similar to the ones parents face in the developed world, but the feelings are recognizable. The book takes a turn part way through that is a real raising of the stakes, I wasn't sure if it would work after that. But to my surprise it got even better. It took me a little while to get into this, but I was glad I did. The prose and I did not always connect, though this is likely a me problem and not a book problem. There were plenty of times when the pacing was right on, I just struggled a bit when it was slower. The emotional stakes made it more than worth it.

Cook is a strong writer. She crafts a world and a set of rules beautifully. The first 1/3 and last 1/3 are stellar. The middle drags. Overall really left me lots to think about in terms of humans mark on nature and the struggle of living without the assistance of technologies we’ve become reliant on. Also mother daughter stuff..but that was less interesting to me.

So, let me just say, up front, that I don’t read science fiction or speculative fiction – or much dystopian fiction … but you will find this book under those categories, when, in reality, it is just exceptional character-driven fiction (Booker Prize nominee).I do enjoy climate fiction, eco-fiction, and literary fiction, which was why I was drawn to this book. Incidentally, this novel paints a pretty realistic vision of the future relative to climate change. So, if you’re like me (or even if you’re not), and Sci-Fi/spec fiction aren’t your go-to genres, this novel is still SO worth a read. I was riveted from the first pages and continued to be mesmerized by the author’s ability to plunge the reader into the hearts of a mother and daughter with such intense emotion and realism. This is “show-don’t-tell” fiction at its absolute best, illustrating the struggles between a mom and daughter growing amid their circumstances while simultaneously growing apart. But, of course, it’s so much more than that, given the group dynamics and ensuing collisions of those in this ‘wilderness experiment.’I’ve always been fascinated by group dynamics (and, if I’m honest, often irritated by group behaviors, in real life). Cook nails these aspects – highlighting those vying for leadership, those who are rule followers, those who aren’t, those who wish to let others pick up the slack… It was so well done; my guess is that this book will have many of you thinking back to your own work environments, group projects and interactions.Nature lovers will find much to admire, also, in the descriptions of the natural world and Agnes’s love for the wilderness. This book really begs the question "Can humans live WITH the environment and IN it, without destroying it?" It also poses questions about the 'animal' nature of humans.And the writing… it is breathtaking. From the geographic settings, and nomadic lifestyle details to the internalizations of characters: [Underwater swimming scene] Agnes wanted to grab all those bubbles and gobble them up so she could have it forever. She felt a mournful longing for her mother, as though she were far away, untouchable. The water made Bea look like she was behind a plate of glass. Agnes reached for her, but she was just far enough away that she couldn’t grab hold.The moon had moved and was now tipping its contents into the sky. The stars pouring from it.They passed into regions of low, strange mountains, a mix of jagged licking peaks and mellow, rolling red-capped hills. From far away, some hills stood like tiered wedding cakes.It was possibly a hundred trees tall or more. The valley was foggy and muted as though the morning sky had fallen to earth.The loamy dry lakebeds, playas, smelled of mushrooms, of dark body crevices. The hot horizon floated in front of their eyes like a river of gold.My only quibble is with the ending. And because I feel 99.9% sure the author was forced into this ending by the publisher, I couldn’t knock my rating down to four stars when I was absolutely enthralled throughout.This is a spectacular book about mother-daughter love, the impacts we, as humans, have made on the environment, and a meditation on leadership and survival. I’m definitely looking forward to what Cook writes in the future!

Set in a near future where almost everyone is confined to the crowded and polluted cities, a group of 20 gets permission to live in the heavily protected Wilderness State. They are required to live under strict rules to prevent any lasting impact on the environment. Mostly the people in this band came to the Wilderness State to escape the suffocating conditions of the city, but they all come to realise that they can't leave themselves behind. They bring all their problems with them. [W]hen they first arrived in the Wilderness, they imagined living there might make them more sympathetic, better, more attuned people. But they came to understand there'd been a great misunderstanding about what "better" meant. It's possible it simply meant better at being human, and left the definition of the word "human" up for interpretation. It might have only meant better at surviving, anywhere, by any means. For the most part, this book is a meditation on motherhood and self-identity; the fraught but necessarily interdependent nature of the mother-daughter relationship. Bea came to the Wilderness State because her daughter Agnes's health was in severe decline in the city. We see her constantly reexamining her reasons for that choice, questioning how living for someone else can ever be enough, even if it is her daughter. Bea vascillates between protectiveness of her child, and yearning for more tangible demonstrations of affection from Agnes. At the same time, she yearns for her own mother, only appreciating now the privileged role of being the daughter, and wishing more than ever for motherly comfort and love. Agnes, prickly and mercurial, seemingly seemingly unknowable to Bea, deals with similarly conflicted feelings about her mother. We see that they are really two sides of the same coin, always connected yet completely separate. Each individual grapples with how their identity is defined both by the people around them and the place they live. Their survival-oriented lifestyle requires detachment and constant watchful calculation, but this seems incompatible with the reality of emotions and feelings constantly swirling inside. The heaviness in her chest inched up to her throat. She guessed it had something to do with being somewhere so familiar when such familiarity wasn't supposed to exist anymore. Not for them. Not in this life. Wasn't that part of the point? To kill off their sense of home? To have them feel at home anywhere? Or nowhere? Were they the same thing? An interesting book that reflects on the idea that attachment to any person or place, love, is never easy, and in the end, each of us is unknowable except to ourselves.

Für den Einstieg hat die Autorin direkt eine sehr traurige, erschreckende Szene gewählt, die aber sehr ruhig und eher emotionslos erzählt wird. Der Tod ist in dieser Wildnis, fernab jeglicher Zivilisation, ein ständiger Begleiter. Er gehört dazu und wird angenommen, mehr oder weniger, alles andere wäre auch schwer zu verkraften bzw. muss man sich eine gewisse Härte zulegen. Sterben war so normal wie Leben. Sie sorgten sich umeinander, natürlich, aber wenn einer von ihnen aus welchem Grund auch immer zu überleben aufhörte, schlossen sie die Reihen und steckten ihre Energie in das, was weiter lebendig blieb. Zitat Seite 57Bea, ihr Mann Glen und ihre mittlerweile 8jährige Tochter Agnes gehören zu dieser auserwählten Gruppe, die das Experiment in der Wildnis gewagt hat. Die Erde ist in dieser Zukunft stark durch Gifte geschädigt und da Agnes schwer krank ist und kaum Überlebenschancen hat, hat sich Bea entschlossen, den Versuch zu wagen. Die frische Luft war das einzige Mittel, um ihrer Tochter zu helfen - und tatsächlich ist Agnes jetzt ein kerngesundes Kind.Wie auch die Erwachsenen beeinflusst dieses Leben natürlich auch das "aufwachsen". Die Sorgen sind völlig anders gewichtet - es geht nicht um gesunde Ernährung, einen erfolgreichen Job, ein tolles Aussehen, "was zieh ich heute an", etc. Kein Handy, kein Fernsehen, keine Nachrichten - reines: Leben!Während dem Lesen kamen mir viele Gedanken. Zum Beispiel auch, dass sich alles verlagert hat. Früher gab es im Äußeren Gefahren und Ängste, die wir heutzutage nicht mehr kennen. Jeder hat genug zu essen und ein Dach über dem Kopf (zumindest in den industriellen Ländern). Das innere Gleichgewicht allerdings, der Natur zu folgen, hat sich ebenfalls gewandelt, so dass wir jetzt die Ängste dafür im Inneren tragen. Bea empfindet ja das Verhalten teilweise unmenschlich, was sich in ihrer Gruppe abspielt bzw. wie es sich entwickelt - wobei man natürlich erstmal überlegen muss, was der Begriff "menschlich" überhaupt beinhaltet. Allerdings denke ich, dass so eine zusammengewürfelte Gruppe nicht immer den Zusammenhalt erfahren kann, als wenn eine Familie, eine Gemeinschaft schon immer beisammen und in diesen Umständen gelebt hat. Das kann man nicht vergleichen. Denn genauso haben wir Menschen ja sehr lange überlebt - ohne die Natur zu zerstören ;) "... ihre eigene Tochter, die seltsam war und affektiert lächelte, die offenbar nicht wusste, was Liebe war, die zu verwildert war, um es zu wissen, die jetzt Aufmerksamkeit wollte, die sie vorher kaum gesucht hatte und jetzt nicht verdiente. Zitat Seite 187 Bea war mir nicht so wirklich sympathisch. Alleine das Zitat spricht für sich, denn woher sollte ihre Tochter lernen zu lieben, wenn sie ihr es selbst nie wirklich gezeigt hatte - außer in Angst und Sorgen. Nichts ist so gelaufen, wie sie sich das vorgestellt hat - doch wann ist das schon so? Ich denke, diese Schuld auf die Tochter zu schieben nagt an ihr und deshalb kann sie ihr nicht wirklich die erwartungslose Liebe entgegen bringen. Doch ein Leben mit einem Kind kann man nicht planen. Man sollte es nicht planen, denn es ist ein eigenständiger Mensch, der da heranwächst, den man unterstützen sollte in allem, was auf ihn zukommt. Kontrolle ist eine Illusion, an die wir uns zu sehr gewöhnt haben und dann völlig überfordert sind wenn wir erkennen, das die Natur über unser Leben bestimmt.Ich fand es sehr gut, dass es einen Wechsel gab und aus Agnes Sicht weitererzählt wurde. Auch für sie ist die Beziehung zu Bea, ihrer Mutter, alles andere als einfach. Zum einen spürt sie natürlich die Sehnsucht nach einer liebenden Mutter in sich, zum anderen spürt sie sehr genau die Ablehnung, die Schuldzuweisung, und entwickelt eine Art Hass.Allerdings kann sie sich an das Leben sehr gut gewöhnen. Für sie ist es normal, da sie ja mit 4 Jahren in die Wildnis gekommen und hier aufgewachsen ist. Agnes konnte mit dieser Diskussion nichts anfangen. Wen interessierte schon das Warum oder Wie? Wen interessiert würde oder würde nicht? Sie hatte noch nie begriffen, warum die Erwachsenen immer über diese Wörter debattierten. Sollen und nicht sollen. Dürfen und nicht dürfen. "Sein und machen", murmelte sie vor sich hin. Das war das Einzige, was zählte. Sein und machen. Jetzt in diesem Moment und kurz danach. Zitat Seite 216Sie lebt im Augenblick. Sie lebt mit der Natur, mit den Jahreszeiten, die sie einzig durch die Veränderungen erkennt. Sie liest die Fährten, findet Wege, lernt zu überleben. Nur die Menschen, die bleiben ihr fremd. Eine Auswirkung der Gruppe, die nicht an einem Strang zieht, die trotz Zusammenhalt jeder für sich wirkt und auch durch die Auflagen des Staates, die Regeln, die sie zu befolgen haben und keine wirkliche Freiheit zulassen.Der Schreibstil wirkt sehr ruhig und nüchtern, dennoch schafft es die Autorin, grade die Flora und Fauna sehr bildhaft rüberzubringen. Das Lernen von den Tieren zu Beispiel, auf ihre Reaktionen zu achten und dadurch Gefahren zu erkennen oder auch Wasser zu finden fand ich sehr faszinierend!Auch die einzelnen Figuren der Gruppe sind teilweise sehr konkret in ihrer Rolle, andere eher blass, Randfiguren, oder Mitläufer und nicht jeder schafft es, sich den Gegebenheiten anzupassen.Ich war jedenfalls gebannt von der gesamten Situation, dem Leben in dieser Wildnis und wie die Menschen auf unterschiedliche Weise damit umgehen.Weltenwanderer

i massively loved Man V Nature so I was STOKED to read this book. and it didn't disappoint.I loved every minute of it. The motherhood of it. The wilderness struggle. The dirt, blood, sinew and sweat. The journey. The survival.Seems eerily prophetic. Go Agnes.

I remember being curious about this when it came out, but I didn’t want to increase my pandemic anxiety by reading about how we’re destroying the earth. And maybe that was right for me at the time, because that is the setting here. But the heart of this story for me took place between the mother and daughter: how each one contains a certain wisdom of life over the other, and how combining approaches can maximize group survival, but can also create power battles and disconnect us from the very closeness we crave. I was concerned this would be too sci-fi during a time when I wanted more familiar simplicity, but I felt the inspiration here drew more from earlier societies that relied on nature. There are rules in this world that must be followed, and enforcers of those rules with a Big-Brother feel, but it was part of an interesting mix. If you’re someone who loves sci-fi and/or speculative fiction, this may disappoint. If you normally stay away from that genre, this book might be your gateway.

This book made very little sense, the plot was full of holes, and the world building was sloppy to say the least. It has nothing in common with the best of recent dystopian fiction (Station Eleven, Exit West, The Wall), in which the suspension of disbelief is only too easy. That said, I'm giving it four stars. I found Agnes to be an entirely compelling character, and while Bea was more uneven, their mother and daughter relationship was gripping. And for all the plot holes and loose threads, after a slower first third, I could not put the book down. The ending was lame, but right up until the very end, I found myself very invested in Agnes and her coming of age struggles. The wilderness is its own character here too, and its power builds for you. So, a good rating in spite of the book's weaknesses, not blind to them.

I don't really know what I was expecting, probably something a bit more highbrow with some deep hidden meanings. This is just a better than average dystopian novel with a pretty lame ending, in fact I hated the ending. The New Wilderness refers to a vast area of untamed land, untouched by humans, but they put 20 humans in there to see if they can live without harming the environment. I hated pretty much ALL the characters, especially Carl who basically wants to repopulate the world with little Carls, but the relationship between mother and daughter is really interesting and watching that develop was the best thing about the book. Like I said, hated the ending, nearly lopped a star off but it is Christmas.

Wow, this was so good! I was admittedly somewhat skeptical going in - did we *really* need more dystopia right now (or ever)? But Cook absolutely pulled this off. The premise is unique, but what really makes the book are the layered, nuanced themes of motherhood & childhood, immigration, climate change, community, and others. There was a very narrow window for this novel to be good, and I think the novel is great.

I can't find any flaw in this story. That doesn't mean there isn't one, but right now I'm overwhelmed by it's distinctive flavor — what the hell was that? I need to spend some time thinking about this.But: well worth reading. Maybe not for everyone, though. Desperate, and lonely, and alien.Of the other reviews here, the one I found most accurate is by Hugh. (Vote his review up for me, please?)