Ms. Hen reviews How High We Go In The Dark

 

How High We Go In The Dark

Sequoia Nagamatsu

Harper Collins

2022

Ms. Hen had been meaning to read this book for a while, but for a long time, it was unavailable at the library. She finally checked it out, and she thinks this is a book worth waiting for.

This is a novel in stories about a plague that comes from the Arctic from a girl scientists find who has has been buried under ice for thousands of years. The plague takes over the world, and millions of people die, and the world changes. Ms. Hen read the different stories about characters who are affected by the plague: the man whose daughter discovered the body in Siberia, someone who works at an amusement park which is a place for euthanizing infected children, and a man who creates a pig who can talk.

This book travels through the years, and into the future when the plague changes history. Characters even travel to space to find a new planet to inhabit. A lot of depressed characters dwell in these pages, and Ms. Hen feels sorry for a lot of them.

Ms. Hen is charmed by this novel, and she didn't want it to end. She has read a lot of books like this lately, like THE THREE BODY PROBLEM, THE HIDDEN GIRL AND OTHER STORIES, and EXHALATION. She seems to be gravitating to science fiction by Asian men, maybe that's a phase for her, but she's not sure. It's just that all of these books are so good that she can't get enough. They're just what she wants right now.

Even though this novel is about a pandemic, it was inspired before COVID happened. Ms. Hen think that pandemics have always been around, and have sparked ideas for writers. People suffering are always more interesting than those that are content.

Ms. Hen read in the acknowledgements in this book that the author was partly inspired by STAR TREK. Ms. Hen does not read that a lot in author notes, and she's glad this one is honest. A lot of writers want their fans to think they're highbrow, and have only read the best books, but Ms. Hen thinks that STAR TREK can be as inspirational as any classic novel.

Ms. Hen recommends that you run, not walk, to get this novel, by bookstore or library, or wherever you acquire books. She thinks this is one of the best books she's read this year. It's not a light summer book, but Ms. Hen doesn't believe in those anyway 😀