Gold Fame Citrus is different from the other novels I’ve read for this blog, in that it takes a far more character based approach. The story is set in America, where, unlike the flooded settings of the other books, there has been a drought and much of South West America has become buried in sand. Water is being rationed and many people are dying from dehydration and starvation.

The story follows main character Luz, who, along with her boyfriend, Ray, find and take a toddler from her neglectful family, with the intention of heading to a safer place. It’s hard not to root for the young family, even though the world in this story is not one to be optimistic about.

The strong images and descriptive writing of Claire Vaye Watkins help to create empathy with the characters, even though they don’t often come across as likeable. The fact that the book is broken up into three sections helps with readability as it separates the stages in Luz’s and Ray’s journey (both physical and mental.)

Unlike the other works of fiction reviewed on this blog, How close to savage the soul is a short story taken from an anthology of short stories, rather than a novel. However, though it is short in length, the story has a powerful message – it is set in the near future, showing an old man and his grandson at the beach, while the old man thinks back to when he was younger and how he was able to enjoy going to the beach with his son, and didn’t worry about climate change. In the present in the story, the economy has crashed, and there’s fire and riots.

The message of the story seems to be that we can still potentially do something about climate change now, but we have to make the conscious choice to do so, or it will be too late.

Unsurprisingly, this short story was very sad to read, but I believe it makes an important point about accountability and the strong writing carries the point through the story.

Rubicon Beach is a novel split into three sections which interlink with each other. The first is set in a flooded Los Angeles, following a man named Cale who has recently been released from prison and keeps seeing a girl decapitating a man, who he believes is already dead. The second section follows the girl, Catherine, from childhood and documents her journey to America and what comes after, while the third section follows a gifted mathematician who is never very precise with dates or ages.

The book is very surreal which suits its apparent interest in the roles dreams play in our lives: for example, the American dream.

As I am looking at the handling of the issue of climate change in science fiction, I couldn’t help but be interested in Erickson’s descriptions of the characters surrounding environment, such as Cale’s numerous boat journeys through flooded Los Angeles, visiting places that we see intact in other sections of the book, such as a hotel that the girl, Catherine visits.

The book was a very different read to the first book I read for this blog: The drowned world by JG Ballard, in that, while The Drowned world can be surreal itself at times, you always have a sense of what the author is trying to tell you, while, in Rubicon Beach, much is left up to the reader’s interpretation.

The Drowned world is the first book I have read for this project, and quite a short one, at 175 pages. It’s also the oldest out of the novels I selected, being first published in 1962, while the others I have chosen were published in the 80’s or post 2000. It follows Dr Robert Kerans, one of a group of scientists surveying the city, who begins having strange dreams about the sun, and starts to become disconnected from modern society, and unwilling to leave the flooded, iguana infested city of London.

‘ The protagonist, Dr Robert Kerans’ unwillingness to leave or change the fate of the city, makes for an interesting read, as the book, rather than looking at ways to fight the changing climate, looks at the way humans might adapt instead, and raises the question: is the world ours to change anyway?

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton