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Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Kunstler's name is mostly associated with nonfiction works like The Long Emergency, a bleak prediction of what will happen when oil production no longer meets demand, and the antisuburbia polemic The Geography of Nowhere. In this novel, his 10th, he visits a future posited on his signature idea: when the oil wells start to run dry, the world economy will collapse and society as we know it will cease. Robert Earle has lost his job (he was a software executive) and family in the chaos following the breakdown. Elected mayor of Union Grove, N.Y., in the wake of a town crisis, Earle must rebuild civil society out of squabbling factions, including a cultish community of newcomers, an established group of Congregationalists and a plantation kept by the wealthy Stephen Bullock. Re-establishing basic infrastructure is a big enough challenge, but major tension comes from a crew of neighboring rednecks led by warlord Wayne Karp. Kunstler is most engaged when discussing the fate of the status quo and in divulging the particulars of daily life. Kunstler's world is convincing if didactic: Union Grove exists solely to illustrate Kunstler's doomsday vision. Readers willing to go for the ride will see a frightening and bleak future. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Book Description
In this astonishing work of speculative fiction, the future is nothing like people thought it would be. This is the story of Robert Earle and his fellow townspeople and what happens to them one summer in a country that has changed profoundly.
--This text refers to the
Audio CD
edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Long Emergency candy coated in a novel.,
By
This review is from: World Made By Hand: A Novel (Hardcover)
An easy read, with careful thought to the characters and plot.This novel is a soft approach to spread the message of the results of a century of gluttonous consumerism, raping of natural resources and the decline of the American Super Power. All the elements are there but since the public on mass isn't yet aware of their sober future the author avoids extremes. Read this book and enjoy the setting unlike any other found in North America today. It's a good story or is it an attempt at prophecy. I gave four stars rather than five only because I think it should have been grimmer.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Compelling reading,
By
This review is from: World Made By Hand: A Novel (Paperback)
Very few books keep me up at night; normally I fall asleep within minutes. I raced through World Made by Hand, its 300+ pages surviving only two sittings.This book tells us what we stand to lose as a result of the converging catastrophes described in The Long Emergency (the end of cheap oil, global warming, and many others). It does so by painting a picture of what life is like after those catastrophes have wiped out the majority of the population in the United States. The plot has suspense. The key characters are interesting, and multi-dimensional; none are caricatures as you might expect in a novel with a point. Likewise, the focus of the book - a future existence that is radically different (agrarian, profoundly local, and without cars, TV, medicines, refrigeration, functioning government or many other things we take for granted) - is presented not as as a singularly horrifying dystopia, but a place with parts of beauty and peace, alongside deprivation and danger. I would have given the book 5 stars, except it needed to deal more with the transition to this future state. It mentions a massive depopulation in the past tense, and the usual suspects - disease, starvation, etc - but only in passing. Unfortunately, our society needs a clearer picture of where it is going if we are to steer in another direction.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
2.0 out of 5 stars
disappointing,
By
This review is from: World Made By Hand: A Novel (Hardcover)
I liked the topic, other than that the book was dissappointing. Maybe people in the southern US still talk like mark twain but I doubt it. I also doubt that if the US post oil turns agrarian people will start talking like they did 150 years ago gosh durn-it. I also could have done with out some 400lb pinheaded mutant that can tell the future or read minds( can't remember I'm reviewing this a year after reading). It totally turned the book from a serious look at future problems into bad Firefly fan fiction. I also could do without the sex scenes. I made it read like penthouse forum story, Older man, younger woman slipping naked into his room, etc, etc. I expected better.
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