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Pros: With Hig being the only narrator, you can feel the isolation and emptiness of everything. Hellers' writing style leaves no doubt that this is a very changed world. It was unnerving, to say the least.
Cons: The writing style took a bit of getting used/Some of the descriptions of fishing were lost on me.
Full Review:
Hig, his loving dog Jasper, and Bangley live at a small airport. Hig has an old Cessna, and Bangley has the guns. They protect each other from the others, who, like them, survived a cataclysmic pandemic that wiped out most of the population.
Hig and Bangley are as different as two people can be. Hig feels everything so acutely that he has trouble killing, even if it means putting himself in danger. He often flies into the mountains to visit a community of Mennonites who were infected with a blood disease that ran rampant after the initial pandemic. Bangley never understands why Hig willingly puts himself in danger like that, getting close to possibly contagious people, but Hig can't explain it. He just does it because it's the right thing to do.
When Higs' world is turned upside down, and he narrowly escapes with his life, he decides it's time for a change. Three years ago, while flying, he received a transmission on his radio from another airport. He hadn't thought to look further, but now, everything's changed. So, though Bangley's skeptical, Hig sets off to see what else the world has to offer and if there are other survivors, if there's more to this life than the misery he's been living.
This was a rough, emotional, and deeply intense book that forced you to look at loneliness, love, and life in a raw, unflinching, and terribly logical way. It's one of those books that will stay with me forever, and though it was heartbreaking, it also showed that even in the direst of circumstances, hope can still exist.
Ended here.
Hig was married to Melissa and she was pregnant but now they’re both gone.
He apparently visits the families and Bangley says, he’ll be the death of them. All it takes is one cough, airborne but Hig just says he’s trying to help them. Bangley would rather have it, just the two of them, it would seem, I think Bangley is gonna be a problem.
There are a few instances where men come to the airport, scavenging but Bangley kills them.
When Hig goes off to the mountains to hunt, he stops by the old tractor trailer of soda that he found. He treats he and Bangley to a can of Coke every month. Now, there are people there. He kills one, then tells the other two to load up the plane with Coke/Sprite and Dr. Pepper. As they're doing this, one of them explains that they heard over their Ham Radio that the Arabs have invaded.
He's wearing a necklace of something or other and when Hig asks him what they are, he says they're...female organs. So, Hig shoots him dead. The other man runs off.
When Hig reports this all to Bangley, Bangley breaks down how he could have done it all so much better. That he is failing in the school of Bangley and he got very lucky to not have been killed. Though Bangley terrifies me, he does make a good point about surviving. Though, I have a feeling it's all going to come to a head. And are people really invading?
On their trip up the mountain, Jasper's moving slower. He's getting older, though Hig tries not to let himself think about that. But when he wakes up the next morning, Jasper's gone. He adds more branches to the fire and lays with him. Then leave him covered in his blanket, with his nose sticking out.
I knew it was going to happen. Still hit hard. At least Bangley didn't do anything to Jasper. That's what I was afraid of. Poor Jasper :(. Poor Hig :(.
He manages to bag two does and as he's coming back, he radios Bangley, who covers him from the tower they built. It turns out he's being hunted by 9 people.
That's a lot of people.
Bangley tells him what to do and for once, Hig is glad that Bangley has his back. I would be too in that situation.
After that ordeal, Hig decides to go to Grand Junction and search the airport, where he first heard that transmission three years earlier. Bangley is skeptical but he wishes Hig good luck and says he'll tend the garden in his absence. It isn't until then that Hig realizes that in his weird, gruff way, Bangley cares about him and, is Hell, his friend.
He flies off and of course, manages to fly over a field where he sees a woman. A man runs out of the house and shoots out the window of Higs plane, thus proving that he's a Hell of a good shot. Hig manages to land the plane, miraculously, in a field and works his way down to the house. There's a tense stand off but eventually, Hig thinks he's made some progress. When he takes shelter behind a tree and ends up falling asleep, only to wake up with a rife in his back, he does as the old man orders. He's brought down to the farm and questioned.
The old man doesn't put up with any nonsense and finally, Hig just lets it all out. He explains that the man can go fuck himself because Hig's dog just died and he doesn't even know why he's out here, or what he's looking for and then he storms off. But the woman stops him and asks him to have lunch with them. Her name is Cimarron, Cima, and the old man is her father.
Hig stays with them for about six weeks until finally, Pops, as Hig calls him, explains that Hig needs to fly them out of here because with the Summer coming, there will be drought and the water will disappear. It's been happening more and more over the year and Pops knows it's not going to stop.
Hig manages to start the plane and take off, with Cima in the passenger seat, two lambs in the bag and they then circle and land on the Interstate and pick up Pops. Together they fly over Denver, which has essentially been burned to the ground. Since Cima and Pops were so isolated on their farm, they never quite saw the destruction. Cima is horrified but as always, Pops keeps his cool.
When they finally reach the other airport, Hig has a bad feeling. Even though there's someone on the radio, instructing them to land, he wonders why the lights are still on and blinking and what's with all the burned out planes around the runway. He decides to listen to his intuition and manages to pull up just as a giant trip wire, essentially, is snapped across the runway. It would have caused them to crash if they'd been landing and so, Hig saves them. He circles around and they land behind a building and he and Pops quickly dispatch of the old man and woman who were hunkering down in the tower. It's an intense scene and I honestly didn't think they were going to make it.
Once they finally reach Erie, Hig and Bangley's airport, His is horrified to see that there's been a fire and the garden is overgrown. His first thought is for Bangley and he runs through Bangley's house, noting the bullet holes and the singe marks. Pops comes with him and explains that they must have caught Bangley by surprise. His refuses to accept that his friend is dead and runs up to the bedroom where he finally realizes just how much Bangley could see from his post. Bangley was always, always watching his bag, always had a good vantage point. He always had Hig's back and Hig is terrfiied that his friend is dead.
That's when they hear a gunshot and rush out to the tarmac to find Cima hiding behind the plane. She's unhurt and Hig runs to the hanger, to find Bangley, shot and half-dead, hiding behind his large tool chest. Luckily, Cima is an internist, an epidemiologist actually, and she manages to help Bangley recover. He and Pops are fast friends, often talking weapons and playing chess and Hig and Cima go to visit the families, and becaues she's a doctor, she helps clean wounds, bring down fevers etc.
They have a good setup and for the first time, Hig feels something similar to peace. The wound of losing Jasper will never heal but, in a way, he's happy. The book ends with three big planes flyng overhead and Hig overhearing a transmission on the radio in Arabic, so perhaps these are the Arabs that the man at the Coke Truck mentioned. Cima says that it's possible that, since the Arabic people are tribal, whole tribes could have been immune. And though Hig calls out to them on the radio, they never answer.
The book ends and we don't know what's going to happen, what the arrival of these new people means or if Hig/Cima/Pops and Bangley will be okay but, I like to think that they live out the rest of their lives together, at the airport, watching each others backs and keeping each other safe.
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