Monday 8 March 2021

#BlogTour How to Survive Everything by Ewan Morrison


It's my turn on the BlogTour How to Survive Everything by Ewan Morrison. Saraband are bringing forward publication of Saltire prize-winner Ewan Morrison’s new novel, How To Survive Everything, in response to the latest lockdown.

About the Author

Ewan Morrison is a multi-award-winning novelist, screenwriter and essayist. His 2019 novel, Nina X, won the Saltire Society Scottish Fiction Book of the Year and is currently being developed as a feature film with a multi-award-winning director. He has previously won the Scottish Book of the Year Fiction Prize (2013) and the Glenfiddich Scottish Writer of the Year (2012). 

His first feature film, an adaptation, was released in five territories in 2016, and was a finalist for four international film awards. American Blackout, a feature length docudrama co-written by Morrison, reached an estimated audience of 30 million viewers. Morrison has also been nominated for three Scottish BAFTAs. 

About the book

The novel, in the face of a terrifying near-future pandemic, is the story of 15-year-old Haley and her 8-year-old brother Ben, kidnapped by their father to his secret lockdown hideaway.  Imprisoned in their new ‘prepper’ environment, designed to deter intruders and equipped with rations of food, medicine and water to ensure their survival when civilisation collapses, they not only have to cope with their parents’ bitter divorce, but choose between deeply conflicting views of reality. 

How to Survive Everything is one teenage girl’s guide to navigating the collapse of everything she knows – including her family and their sanity.

Review

The last person you expect to kidnap you is your loving parent right? Or to isolate you from the world and teach you how to survive the kind of catastrophe that leaves only the toughest survivalists in its wake. How do you deal with that as a teenage girl? You write your own survival guide and a warning of sorts.

I think the author makes an interesting point about preppers, who is to say that what they are prepping for isn't going to eventually come to pass. Given the past year it's fair to say none of us know what is behind the corner or how bad a potential catastrophe or pandemic could potentially get.

How does a family deal with a conspiracy theorist, a movement that has grown considerably in the last few years. With what appears to be outlandish ideas and alternate realities, and what if those ideas are grounded in reality?

What starts out as preparing for a premise and a fear, could become the preparation for the real scenario. I loved the way it was a dystopian come domestic thriller. A real dysfunctional family and their problems combined with the serious element of a changing world. A parent convinced his children need to be prepped for the end of world and at the same time shutting his ex-partner down by taking what she cares about most. Is it revenge or genuine concern?

I also adored the snarky teenage voice as the narrator. A how to guide as only a teenage girl can view and describe it. It puts an element of wit, desperation and comedy to the story at times.

Buy How to Survive Everything at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher : Contraband pub date 1 Mar. 2021. Buy at Amazon com.

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