The Book of Etta (The Road to Nowhere, 2) Paperback – February 21, 2017

You know how when you finish reading a really really good book, you want to read another book right away? So you pick up a new book but put it back down after a few paragraphs, and you open another book but close it quickly, too. And you realize that your head is still full of the really really good book, and you’ll have to wait for it to clear.Reading Meg Elison’s The Book of the Unnamed Midwife followed by its companion novel The Book of Etta did that to me.The two books, which together form the first two parts of The Road to Nowhere series, are satisfying on many levels.The books explore gender both overtly and subtly, as it affects the characters and societies and plot. In the fragmented groups that the main character in each book encounters, we get to see a variety of responses to the scarcity of women caused by the worldwide plague. Those responses seem natural because Elison handles them deftly; they unfold as organic elements, supported by solid worldbuilding and thorough character development. And each of them shows us something different than the others, something complex, about gender, personhood, difference, and agency in our societies today. Many of the responses pose questions. Some questions are answered, and some are perhaps unanswerable.The books have heart. The characters are round and full of life; their emotions feel real, sometimes surprising but always true, even when the characters are hiding or struggling with truth.The books’ prose balances detail and restraint; meaningful detail is sometimes purposefully underplayed, which rewards close reading and offers the attentive reader the pleasure of fitting puzzle pieces into place.This review may sound stuffy and academic and clumsy, but I promise you, The Book of the Unnamed Midwife and The Book of Etta are deeply personal and mesmerizing.

I read over one-hundred books in 2016, but the predecessor to this book, The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, was my favorite of them all. And even though that’s one of the most powerful books I’ve still ever read in my entire life, it’s also one of the heaviest books I’ve ever read. So, I’ve been putting off this second installment for far too long. But, friends, I finally picked it up and I’m so happy that I did. But again, as much as this book was also powerful, it’s also so very heartbreaking.In The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, 98% of Earth's population of men and 99% of Earth's population of women have died from an autoimmune disease. Even though most of the Earth's population was wiped out, the ratio of men to women is immense. And even in the future from the initial outbreak, women are still the most sought-after thing. In this second installment, the timeline is many generations in the future (approximately one-hundred-years), but we get to the community that the unnamed midwife helped build. This current community has adapted so many of the things that we saw in The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, and we get to see that not a lot has changed in this post-apocalyptic world.“I’m Eddy on the road, and I’m Etta at home. I’m both.”And we follow Etta when she is with her community, Nowhere, and we follow Eddy when he is scavenging outside of his community. I am going to use they/them pronouns for the rest of this review, but I believe our main character is nonbinary and genderfluid, even though those words are never used on page. This entire book really puts gender at the front of this story, because Etta/Eddy doesn’t want to be what is expected of a woman in this world. They don’t want to become a mother, they don’t want to raise children, and they do not want to deliver babies. They want to hunt, and forage, and rescue girls that aren’t even given a choice in this new and cruel world. Also, Etta/Eddy is black and also sees how racism hasn’t ceased, even with the world almost ending.“Boys can be anything. Girls can only be one thing.”We also are introduced to a transwoman in this book who becomes such a pivotal character. Flora completely made my heart break in this book, but she was also such a bright beacon of hope. She honestly deserves the entire world, and she better be given it in the final book, The Book of Flora.But we get to see Etta/Eddy travel to different communities from their own and see how the different groups and people live and prosper. Some treat women lower than currency, some treat them like mystical saints, but we get to see all the in-betweens, too. Etta/Eddy meets Flora rather quickly, and they soon travel together to the worst city Etta/Eddy may have seen yet. When they reach the stronghold of the Lion, they aren’t entirely sure what to expect. But even their nightmares wouldn’t prepare them for what this tyrant ruler is truly like.This is a very dark and heavy book. Please use caution before reading and make sure you are in a safe headspace. Major content and trigger warnings for rape, sexual assault, genital mutilation, pedophilia, sex trafficking, slavery, murder, death, loss of a loved one, miscarrying, torture, misgendering, racist comments, misogynistic comments, abduction, captivity, violence, animal death, and war themes.“On the map, all the roads led to Estiel.”Overall, Meg Elison writes the LGBTQIAP+, feminist, inclusionary literature of my heart. This book is important, and powerful, and empowering. It’s hard, and brutal, and heartbreaking, but I promise it is so rewarding. The reason I am giving it four stars is because the ending felt rushed to me. And even though I loved this entire ending with the soul of my being, it just happened in the blink of an eye. Yet, I am so excited to see where the next book picks up, because I am sort of obsessed with their location! But friends, if you are in the right headspace, please give The Book of the Unnamed Midwife a try. It’s truly a masterpiece, and this entire series means more to me than I have words for.

The Book of EttaIn the Book of Etta, we follow the trials and tribulations of one of the descendants of those few women trained by the Unnamed Midwife to care for those priceless gems who can still successfully give birth to newborns one hundred years after the fall of mankind.The thing is, Etta doesn’t want to be a midwife. Nor does she wish to bear children. She follows in the footsteps of the Unnamed Midwife herself, who travelled the wilds armed with nothing but an antique revolver and her wits.Thus, Etta becomes a raider – and one of the most successful ones Nowhere has ever seen.But a raider’s life is fraught with danger, as Etta discovers to her cost when she deviates from her normal routines and encounters strangers who demonstrate that – despite the calamity almost ending mankind’s reign – you still can’t trust human nature . . . or our capacity to learn from the mistakes of the past.A superb sequel to a hauntingly poignant series, and one of the most compelling reads you’ll ever come across.

So I originally ordered the first book in the series, not knowing that it was part of a three part set. The first book was 10 out of 10 great story, original, very entertaining. The second book is not bad, but I felt that it separated from most of the things I enjoyed about the first book.