This Is the Way the World Ends

by James Morrow

Paperback, 1995

Status

Available

Call number

813.54

Genres

Science Fiction

All Topics

Fiction

Collection

Your library

Publication

Mariner Books (1995), Paperback, 336 pages

Description

When tombstone engraver George Paxman is offered a bargain, he doesn't hesitate. His beloved daughter gets an otherwise unaffordable survival suit to protect her from radioactive fall-out and all George has to do is sign a document admitting that, as a passive citizen who did nothing to stop it, he has a degree of guilt for any nuclear war that breaks out. George signs on the dotted line. And then the unthinkable happens. The world and everyone in it (survival suit or not) is destroyed in a nuclear Armageddon - except for George and five others who must now face prosecution from the great mass of humanity who will now never be born. And George Paxman stands accused in the name of all the people who stood by and never raised a finger to stop the horror of nuclear war ...… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member labbit440

Probably the best post-apocalyptic novel I've ever read. Without giving too much away, the ending left me devastated, but also ashamed that I hadn't seen it coming, hadn't seen the seriousness of the work for what it was. In other words, James Morrow had me wrapped around his finger the whole time.

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LibraryThing member nbmars

One of my favorite books, and unfortunately, not out of date! (JAF)

LibraryThing member ft_ball_fn

I just couldn't get into this. It started out a promising PA book as the nukes fell. The personal protection suits, etc.. I was good with. When the book swung way out into left field--talking penguins and robots and 2 people put on trial for destroying the world (not the people who pushed the

button mind you)... the whole story turned to blah blah blah for me. I was expecting (hoping for?) a solid PA book about struggling to survive after the nukes. Instead there were whacked out metaphors and veiled political musings... none of which was I interested in at all. I finished it--but was happy when it was over because I was done as soon as the story left any shred of reality fiction behind and went not just into left field but outer space.

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LibraryThing member whitebalcony

I usually love post apocalyptic tales.. but this was just plain weird.. I don't care if Arthur C Clarke read it ten times.

LibraryThing member seldombites

This is the Way the World Ends is a satire about the end of the world through nuclear war. We are not present at these events. Rather, we see them as they are being related to a young Jewish boy who has found his way into the study of Nostrodamus. This story has a surreal, dream-like quality that

leaves the reader feeling slightly uneasy, without quite knowing why. However, there are some valid points made by the author and this is a book that truly makes one think. Is mutual assured destruction really a deterrent? Can accidents truly not happen? And to what extent are we, as passive citizens, responsible for world events? In my opinion, This is the Way the World Ends is one of the better post-apocalyptic novels I have read.

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LibraryThing member figre

In the first half of this book, the world is destroyed by fire. (In fact, the bombs drop in Chapter Five, a mere 50 pages in.) The first half of this book is fast-paced with new and different ideas thrown at you before you can grasp the one that came before. As an example, within the first few

lines (excluding the Prologue which, along with Entr’acte and Epilogue, uses Nostradamus as the storyteller) we are introduced to personal protection devices – suits that will ensure the wearer survives a nuclear holocaust (spoiler alert: they don’t work). The ideas continue to hit fast and furious. And, it becomes quickly evident that a skilled writer is at work here. In particular, his description of the nuclear holocaust is disturbingly brilliant. It is all the horrors and fears you have seen in your mind brought to life on the page.

In the second half of the book the theme is ice. I cannot tell if it is on purpose, but this second half seems to occasionally slip into a more glacial pace. A few people are put on trial for the sins of the entire human race – the sin of destroying the world – and this trial goes on a bit much. Morrow has a point and he is going to make sure he makes it. But, once the trial is over, there are still more interesting things that will happen.

But let’s hammer home the main pint; Morrow is a talented writer. And, my comments about the slow pace of the second half aside, this is a very entertaining and thought-provoking book. Read it for the ideas, read it for the writing, read it for the way it makes you think, just read it.

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LibraryThing member unclebob53703

SPOILERS. A down-the-rabbit-hole farce on the end of the world and after, it consists largely of people responsible for the conflagration being put on trial for it by people who were supposed to have been born, but never got the chance to. Didn't think I'd be able to get into it, but the writing is

superb and much of it is hilarious. And I got totally sucker punched by the ending, which after all the laughter, manages to be heart-breaking. This is a writer in complete control of his craft, pulling out all the stops.

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LibraryThing member bness2

This is what I would call an avant-garde or surrealist approach to writing about the potential for a nuclear holocaust. It captures all the insanity of the cold war buildup of the nuclear arsenals of of Russia and the US during the 50s through the 80s and adds further to it by considering what a

post-apocalyptic world might be like for those few who survive it. It truly is a combination of insanity and biting satire, a sort of Alice in Wonderland for the nuclear age.

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LibraryThing member questbird

A sad and funny satire about the destruction of humanity by nuclear exchange and, surprisingly, its aftermath, especially as it pertains to everyman small-town tomb-inscriber George Paxton.

LibraryThing member smichaelwilson

Probably one of the more interesting nuclear holocaust books you'll ever read, James Morrow takes on the concept that post-apocalypse stories are always told from the survivor's point of you and introduces a nuclear wasteland in which the last surviving human is forced to stand trial by the souls

of all those lives ended and prevented by nuclear annihilation. Morrow has a talent for bringing philosophical and theological into a very physical world for contemplation and review, and this book is no exception.

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LibraryThing member NurseBob

When the world ends it's neither the living nor the dead you have to worry about in this occasionally heavy-handed apocalyptic satire in which a group of men (just men?) accused of aiding and abetting Armageddon must face a most unusual jury. Or maybe it's just a bedtime story...

LibraryThing member miken32

Suffers from that particularly male premillenial obsession with sex, and also the dated nature of nuclear apocalypse worries. How many conversations do I need a book’s protagonist to have with his cum? Precisely zero.

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