Far North by Marcel Theroux

Book Jacket
"Far North" takes the reader on a quest through an unforgettable arctic landscape, from humanity's origins to its possible end. Haunting, spare, yet stubbornly hopeful, the novel is suffused with an ecstatic awareness of the world's fragility and beauty, and its unexpected ability to recover from our worst trespasses.

In this post-apocalyptic, dystopian view of a future where heat and starvation have caused people to flee to the far north, Makepeace, the sheriff and maybe last survivor of a failed city lives in solitary isolation. Following a series of events, Makepeace decides to venture out into the greater world to discover what is happening there. This world is a very dangerous place peopled by thugs, robbers, murderers and slave traders. Makepeace is captured and sold into a slave camp but manages to escape after five years, only to reach "the Zone" a huge, empty and radioactive city also filled with anthrax. Through Makepeace's eyes, the author shows us not just the brutality of this world, but also its beauty and the enduring hope that humanity will survive. This novel is thought-provoking as the reader asks "what would I be prepared to do to survive?" What makes us human, and what does it take to remove the constraints that civilized society places on us? From the beginning there are surprises, twists and turns enough to keep the reader turning the pages and wondering if Makepeace will make it home again.

Publisher's Weekly gave this novel a starred review.

If you like this book, you might like these.
Cormac McCarthy's 'The Road', John Wyndham's 'Chrysalids' or Margaret Atwood's 'Oryx and Crake'.