Review: 'The End We Start From' by Megan Hunter

I recently read Megan Hunter's novella The Harpy and became not so mildly obsessed with it. This reminded me that I had a copy of Hunter's prizewinner, The End We Start From, hidden away in my TBR. I'll explain below why it took me a time to get through to it, but also why I have now absolutely fallen in love with it. Megan Hunter is becoming an instant-read author for me! Thanks to Grove Atlantic and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. My sincere apologies for the long delay in reviewing!

Pub. Date: 11/7/2017
Publisher: Grove Atlantic

Preempted by publishers around the world within days of the 2016 London Book Fair, The End We Start From heralds the arrival of Megan Hunter, a dazzling and unique literary talent. Hunter’s debut is a searing original, a modern-day parable of rebirth and renewal, of maternal bonds, and the instinct to survive and thrive in the absence of all that’s familiar.

As London is submerged below floodwaters, a woman gives birth to her first child, Z. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place. The story traces fear and wonder as the baby grows, thriving and content against all the odds.

The End We Start From is an indelible and elemental first book—a lyrical vision of the strangeness and beauty of new motherhood, and a tale of endurance in the face of ungovernable change.

So why did I not read The End We Start From straightaway? I was absolutely intrigued by the premise and by the hype around it, and yet the latter kind of scared me off. I'm a bit stubborn and really want to be able to make up my own mind about a book, so I often need to create a little distance between myself and the hype before I can read a popular book. In the case of The End We Start From that meant that I waited a little too long, and then an actual pandemic hit, a disaster which felt like the end of the world and it also didn't feel like the right time. But thanks to The Harpy I knew I should stop coming up with excuses and face the proverbial music. The End We Start From is a heartbreakingly beautiful and sad novella, one which both inspires and fills one with fear. In a sense I'm glad I waited until now, as I don't know I would have appreciated it as much in 2017. (Still, my apologies for the delay.)

A woman is about to give birth, while her husband is out fishing. But this isn't her biggest problem, as catastrophic floods submerge London. She manages to flee with her son Z and her husband R to his parents' house, but the floods bring with them other challenges. As the mother's world shrinks to her husband and son, and then just her son, The End We Start From tells a fractured but heartfelt tale of birth and rebirth, life and death, the beauty of small things, and the incomprehensibility of the complex, amid a natural disaster. Our female narrator is never named, and all other characters are only referred to by a single letter. It creates a kind of distance, on the one hand, and yet, on the other, also feels very intimate, as if you're familiar enough with them to use nicknames. No need for formal introductions here. The intimacy continues throughout the novella as the narrator opens up her life to the reader, however limited it has become. 

What I enjoyed about The Harpy is also true for The End We Start From. The story is told in short, brief, snatches which do not always connect directly. Between these, we get small glimpses at what seem to be apocalyptic texts, lines from what could be prayers for a new, Edenic world, and more. As far as I'm aware, these stem from the Book of Genesis, but even if they don't resonate in a Biblical way, they resonate on a mythical level. It adds am extra layer of depth to what would otherwise be, technically, a straightforward tale of a new mother trying to survive in a changed and hard world. Because this central tale isn't told in an expansive way, though, it also remains mysterious and full of question marks. Rather than paint a full picture, Hunter gives the reader brief glimpses, sneak peeks at a complexity of feelings and events which cannot be put into words. For some readers the plot may be a little too lean, which is understandable. I, however, very much reveled in the silences Hunter places throughout her story. As I have found in my own literary research, sometimes silences do speak louder than words, and the things Hunter leaves unsaid, the things that cannot be discussed, for which no words exists, echo throughout The End We Start From. Whether it is the woman's enormous love for her son, her wonder at this new world, her conflicted feelings towards her husband, we get to see some of it, but much is also left to our own imagination. If that's something you enjoy, The End We Start From is absolutely for you. 

I give this novella..

4 Universes!

The End We Start From is, for me, all the things the critics said. It is a lyrically precise tale of motherhood, renewal, destruction, loss, and love, in which Hunter manages to create depth through silence.