From the Bookshelf of The Perks Of Being A Book Addict…

She had heard something once, long in the past, about love and letting go. She did not recall the words, only the idea: that loss was love’s accounting, its unit of measure, as a foot was made of inches, a yard was made of feet.

The Ferryman is a sci-fi novel about an island where survivors of the Earth’s climate disasters have huddled and let the remaining world do whatever they want out of sight and mind. There are primarily two narrators, Proctor Bennett, the ferryman, and Thea, an

She had heard something once, long in the past, about love and letting go. She did not recall the words, only the idea: that loss was love’s accounting, its unit of measure, as a foot was made of inches, a yard was made of feet.

The Ferryman is a sci-fi novel about an island where survivors of the Earth’s climate disasters have huddled and let the remaining world do whatever they want out of sight and mind. There are primarily two narrators, Proctor Bennett, the ferryman, and Thea, an art dealer.

Those who live on the island can be forcibly “retired” when their health monitor level gets low enough, at which time one of the ferry folks assists with getting them on a boat to sail off to a nearby island where they are recycled into new beings at about age 16. There are no children; those on the island cannot reproduce and no new children are introduced.

This is how the book starts, but there is an awful lot of action in the plot, with themes such as grief, civilization, and the ethicality of rich people essentially ignoring service folks who make cities and towns run.

Each section of the book (there are eight parts) could be its own sci-fi novella. That they all make up one book is good news for those of us who love action with a side of emotions. That said, this is a deeply emotional book. At some point deep in the novel, Proctor muses about the interchangeability of different relations, e.g., sister to mother to daughter. While there is obviously a difference, at different times in our lives, these roles can seem to have been swapped, such as when an adult child takes care of a parent who is gravely ill.

While there were villains and even heroes whose choices I disliked, this book and this author are a new favorite.