\nThis tale of doom and resilience\nby Alistair MacKay follows\nthree queer friends who must navigate climate collapse as their world\nunravels. Cape Town\u2019s elite has fled to The Citadel, a\ntemperature-controlled dome on Signal Hill where the citizens live in\nvirtual reality, blind to what\u2019s around them. In contrast, beneath\nthem is Kapelitsha, a slum with searing temperatures and almost no\nwater. There is a heightened awareness of a staggered class system.\nDespite the dystopian genre and the desolate backdrop of apocalyptic\nrealism, this feels close to home; some Cape\nTown suburbs are\nmentioned by name. The novel struck me as an Orwellian tragedy, a\nspiraling story of rational dread, prophetic in addressing what we\nare really facing as a likely future. Structurally the book reads as\na count down from the present day to near future doom. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe characters are rendered with\nvulnerability. The\nrepresentation of queer romance feels honest and robust with moments\nthat are remarkably sweet and soft, and others that are pure\ndevastation. The writer does not shy away from the darkest sides of\nhomophobia. Viwe\u2019s shame and self-loathing at being gay due to\nRelevations<\/em>-type\nreligious condemnation is the most heartbreaking journey to follow.\nThis character left me crying snot\nen trane<\/em>. Luthando,\nthe resolute environmental activist presents a more self-assured\nrevolutionary image. And Malcolm, friend-zoned by Luthando, is the\nonly white main character, with a fickle sense of ally-ship\nthat\u2019s all too familiar in South Africa. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nMilo is a child being raised in\nthis climate, hardly allowed to move during the daylight (which the\nauthor terms stillness hours when the sun is at its worst). The\ndevastating thing about this kid\u2019s childhood\nis that, at his most energetic and vital time of his life, he has to\nremain completely still in order to survive. For me, this brought up\nideas of anti-natalism,\nthe ethical question of whether or not to have children in a world\nthat will inevitably destroy them, leaving them a withering crisp as\nthey grow older.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nSet in the context of climate\ncollapse, It\ndoesn\u2019t have to be this way<\/em>\ndeals with enormously high stakes. It\u2019s a weapon forged against our\napathy. The inherent burning question felt by this reader was: why\nare people not freaking out about where the world is going? It\u2019s\na profound warning of our fragility. While it depicts an unforgiving\npicture of humanity\u2019s suicide, the writer\u2019s description of nature\nis blistering and beautiful. An alchemical, cosmic relationship\nbetween man and earth exists in this book. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nOf course, this delicate dynamic\nis at odds\nwith our capacity for destruction. The late-stage capitalist\nexpansion of advanced virtual reality seems to run parallel with our\ndevolution as a society. The\nreader is made to wonder about the insidious capacity of mental\nsoftware with the novel\u2019s\nexploration of eliminating trauma memory, the idea of trauma removal\nfor a more subdued society. This fascinating and bone-chilling\nconcept plays itself out in the insulated world of The Citadel. The\nbig morally dubious corporation in the novel could be likened to\nApple or Amazon \u2013 an all-powerful multi-national conglomerate\npotentially with big enough sway for this kind of mind control.\nPowerful\nenough to situate us firmly on the wrong side of history. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nExistential and\nanti-consumerist, this novel reveals that we need a reimagined\neconomic system and this reimagining has to be enormous. It reminds\nus that we are more than our labour. It narrates cataclysmic climate\ncollapse in real terms with relatable characters. The title,\nnaturally, presupposes an alternate future. And that future is up to\nus. \n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This tale of doom and resilience by Alistair MacKay follows three queer friends who must navigate climate collapse as their world unravels. Cape Town\u2019s elite has fled to The Citadel, … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":4691,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4690"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4690"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4690\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4692,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4690\/revisions\/4692"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}