The End of the World

By: HS Gilchrist

ISBN: 9781738061112

Dystopian Sunrise Press (2024)

This is the first novel in a trilogy (or series) and offers very little resolution. However, it does offer an entrance into an interesting story.

Animikii is a warrior, but one who’s been enslaved by the Technocrats. After something goes wrong in battle, she has a limited time to repair or remove the invasive tech inside her. Otherwise it will either kill her or destroy the last of her humanity.

She finds herself allied with Mica Stone, a black market recycler who faces her own struggle. Survival is hard, and she has to do it while avoiding those who’d like to use the power of her dreams to awaken a sleeping god.

The two of them find their struggles begin to align, as both slowly realise that their individual struggles may have grave implications for everyone. If they fail, the world could end.

I didn’t find this novel particularly outstanding. I struggled to engage with or care about the characters, and for a substantial part of the novel I felt that there was no clear goal or reason to be interested in what was going on. This is something of a slow burn, however, and while I never really loved the characters, an interesting, if somewhat jumbled, plot did eventually emerge.

It does feel a bit as though Gilchrist has thrown everything into this novel: multiple worlds, magic, crazed gods. degraded technology, high level futuristic technology, evil scientists, robotic soldiers… if you’ve ever seen it in a science fiction novel, you’ll probably see it again here. And it is, perhaps, a bit much.

Although I think part of Gilchrist’s point was intended to be the clash between the more naturalistic, grounded society that Animkii comes from and the highly technological society of the Technocrats, the result is actually a bit confused.

The novel is trying to depict both a magical/spiritual fight against an invader from another world or dimension, and a highly technological fight against (essentially) mad scientists. The two don’t meld all that well. At the end of the novel the two plots still seem very separate.

This is clearly the start of a series or trilogy; no resolution is offered for anything. I’d say it left me on a cliffhanger, except that I didn’t care very much.

This ambitious novel falls short of what it’s aiming for. Still, it’s full of interesting ideas, and some readers may find that sufficient.

I’m not sure I’d recommend it: I found it boring and confused. However,  it’s possible the story will come to fruition in a later volume and this will look better in that context. Those with patience might like to give it a try.