A review by just_one_more_paige
Severance by Ling Ma

adventurous challenging reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

 
This has been on my TBR shelf figuratively, and then literally, for years now. I remember many people who read it after the start of COVID saying it was maybe too real, and to be careful with it, so I waited a while. And phew, those people were right. 
 
Severance follows an MC, Candace, as she navigates a contemporary NYC office drone job, a post-apocalyptic road trip, and millennial ennui existence, survival in a world shutting down around her, and life in (mid)western America as a young immigrant/daughter of immigrants. And for being published in 2018, it is wildly prescient of what the shutdown around COVID would look like for the world. Like, to the point where, if you told me Ma could see the future, I would totally believe you. This was a super internal narrative, for a post-apocalyptic story. Following Candace's many mental-emotional responses and journeys, including myriad flashbacks and anecdotes from her life "before," was interesting. Like, you know the world is falling around her, and can tangibly imagine it (now, post-COVID, especially...the shutdown part, of course, not the presence of the virus). And yet, because you are experiencing it all from within her own mind, it's weirdly distant at the same time? Like real life at a remove? Stylistically, it reminded me, a bit, of Chemistry. And the ending leaves the reader on the precipice of an unknown future, but with hope that it’ll be something new/different. Not better per se, but not worse? Something recreated… It's a common vibe for the speculative fiction genre (like Station Eleven, The Z-Word, The Book of M, and others). 
  
In these pages, Ma manages a (hefty) critique of capitalism/consumerism, a post apocalyptic societal collapse (a la Station Eleven), a character study, a critique of paternalism and patriarchy, a darkly-borderline-humorous observance of humanity and our estimation of ourselves as measured by societal rules and workplace habits, with just a dash of art. There’s a lot of commentary to unpack within it. And I think the real beauty of this novel (in addition, of course, to the clear intention of the writing) is that the details are so meticulous that every reader will notice and respond to something a little different. It makes it a really individualized reading experience, for all that it addresses some very universal themes. 
 
 “I could do that indefinitely: roam the streets, look up into a window and imagine myself into other people’s lives.” 
“The past is a black hole, cut into the present day like a wound, and if you get too close, you can get sucked in.” 
 
“Memories beget memories.” 
 
“To live in a city is to live the life that it was built for, to adapt to its schedule and rhythms […] To live in a city is to take part in and to propagate its impossible systems. […] It is also to take pleasure in those systems because, otherwise, who could repeat the same routines, year in, year out?” 
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