Review by Booklist Review
The final installment of Elison's Road to Nowhere trilogy (after The Book of Etta, 2017) is dedicated to all the radical queers in the author's life. The book is told primarily from Flora's point of view in the years following the destruction of Estiel. Flora is attempting to record as much of her travels as possible before an almost mythological army descends upon Bambritch Island, where she and Alice settled more than a decade ago anything to leave a piece of history behind. Handwriting her own stories and copying journals, she gives a glimpse into her childhood and the years spent on the road with Alice and Eddy, who has since transitioned entirely from Etta to his male identity. She also muses at length about the constricting nature of enforcing a gender binary as she and her companions stumble upon communities that all seem to create their own norms. Elison's trilogy is a refreshing exploration of gender unique to postapocalyptic sf. Its shocking conclusion will leave readers reeling and rethinking what they know about gender identity and trauma.--Rachel Colias Copyright 2019 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
This grim, poetic conclusion to Elison's postapocalyptic Road to Nowhere trilogy widens its scope from reproductive rights to gender binaries and the consequences of stories. Forty years after the events of The Book of Etta, the Bambritch Island community trembles on the brink of invasion. Amidst the slow-gathering siege, Flora, a silk thrower and former slave turned slaver's apprentice, records her travels across Elison's now-familiar postplague landscape, journeying from an underground matriarchal Mormon town to Shy, a glittering women-only city with dark foundations, and the Alexandria, a warship crewed by librarians. Most importantly, she details her adoption of enslaved child Connie, an act with far-ranging consequences. Though the pace sometimes lags, Elison balances complex protagonists with the slow mythologizing of their stories. As prophecies and worldviews go to war, Flora's elegiac statement that "only what is remembered survives" takes on additional relevance. This slow novel builds into an urgent, ferociously readable warning about the power of belief to maim-or heal. Readers will find this a powerful conclusion to a fascinating series. Agent: Danielle Svetcov, Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary. (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Flora does not fit into the postapocalyptic landscape the world has become after a series of plagues known as the Dying decimated society. Females are a precious commodity in this world, where birth is rare and highly prized, and they are traded and enslaved. Flora will never conceive a child. Not in the underground city of Ommun, where refugees have gathered to find shelter, nor in the all-female city of Shy, where she hoped to find a place for herself and others. As Flora and her companions head out to find a place to call their own, along the way, she adopts a child, Connie. Aboard a ship, whispers of a hope for the future of humanity arises: reproduction may take root in a new way. Yet that same hope creates a rift in Flora's created family, and she's forced to make choices between the place and the people she loves. Alternating between the present and flashbacks, Flora's history intertwines with those of previous characters to create an intriguing sf tale. VERDICT Combining a grim, futuristic world, fascinating character relationships, and a deep exploration of gender roles and identity, the last of -Elison's "Road to Nowhere" trilogy (after The Book of Etta) offers a sound and satisfying -conclusion.-Kristi -Chadwick, Massachusetts Lib. Syst., Northampton © Copyright 2019. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The restless conclusion of The Road to Nowhere trilogy, set generations after a virulent disease killed most men and even more women, making women a precious commodity and childbirth a hazardous enterprise.Flora, a transwoman raised as a sex slave, tells her story from essentially two points of view: as an old woman writing her autobiography after many years of residence on Bambritch (Bainbridge) Island near Settle (Seattle) as an invasion looms; and as a younger woman continuing the plot from The Book of Etta (2017), sprinkled with memories of her difficult childhood and adolescence. Having killed the Estiel (St. Louis) warlord known as the Lion, the survivors of his harem have taken somewhat uneasy refuge in the underground town of Ommun, a matriarchal Mormon community led by Alma, whose many successful pregnancies and supposedly divine visions have led her followers to believe her a prophet. Flora; her lover Alice, a skilled herbalist and occasional abortionist; the transman Eddy, Flora's unrequited love and one of Alice's other lovers; and a small group of followers reject Alma's theocratic governance and return to the world above, where they search for somewhere that will allow them to live without the threat of slavers and rigid expectations of gender and sexuality. The market is currently flooded with dystopias in which women are valued for their breeding and rarity as sexual receptacles, where the divide between women and men has grown and the definition of gender is more rigidly reinforced. This series, and this book in particular, refreshingly argues that despite violent opposition, an imbalance in the number of women and men might offer more freedom for some to make their own definitions of gender, sexuality, and selfhood and that even in a world where fertility is damaged and pregnancy a risk, one doesn't need to devote oneself to having or facilitating the having of babies to be valuable. If the story has a flaw, it is the author's penchant to suddenly introduce a meaty bit of plot just before the book ends and then quickly conclude without fully exploring it.A thoughtful extrapolation of contemporary gender and sexuality issues in need of wider discussion and understanding. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
