Severance

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Ling Ma: Severance (Hardcover, 2018, Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Hardcover, 291 pages

English language

Published Oct. 28, 2018 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

ISBN:
978-0-374-26159-7
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OCLC Number:
1004911431

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(2 reviews)

Candace Chen, a millennial drone self-sequestered in a Manhattan office tower, is devoted to routine. So she barely notices when a plague of biblical proportions sweeps New York. Then Shen Fever spreads. Families flee. Companies halt operations. The subways squeak to a halt. Soon entirely alone, still unfevered, she photographs the eerie, abandoned city as the anonymous blogger NY Ghost.

Candace won’t be able to make it on her own forever, though. Enter a group of survivors, led by the power-hungry IT tech Bob. They’re traveling to a place called the Facility, where, Bob promises, they will have everything they need to start society anew. But Candace is carrying a secret she knows Bob will exploit. Should she escape from her rescuers?

A send-up and takedown of the rituals, routines, and missed opportunities of contemporary life, Ling Ma’s Severance is a quirky coming-of-adulthood tale and satire.

1 edition

reviewed Severance by Ling Ma

Severance

This was not a revolutionary novel by any means, but I really appreciated how Ling Ma incorporated a lot of social issues created by capitalism throughout this book. She touches on immigration, worker's rights, outsourcing jobs, etc. It hit a little close to home at times "post-Covid" and honestly I was surprised to see that it was written before that. This is one of those books that you only see things from Candace's perspective, so as she's dealing with things or escaping scenarios, you don't get well-rounded endings for everything. Things happen, and the story moves on along with her life. If you don't llike loose ends, probably not one that I would recommend.

reviewed Severance by Ling Ma

The end of the world, or the end of capitalism?

“Someone once said that it is easier to imagine the end of the world than to imagine the end of capitalism. We can now revise that and witness the attempt to imagine capitalism by way of imagining the end of the world.” (Fredric Jameson)

I read this book in 2021, which no doubt coloured my intrepretation of it, but it's left a lasting impression. A really biting portrayal of modern "knowledge work", and the increasing absurdity of Candace's life as the wheels gradually fall off her world...

Subjects

  • Epidemics
  • Fiction
  • Science fiction
  • Literary fiction

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