by: Ian McEwan
Goodreads description:
A quest, a literary thriller and a love story, What We Can Know spans the past, present and future to ask profound questions about who we are and where we are going.
2014: A great poem is read aloud and never heard again. For generations, people speculate about its message, but no copy has yet been found.
2119: The lowlands of the UK have been submerged by rising seas. Those who survive are haunted by the richness of the world that has been lost.
Tom Metcalfe, a scholar at the University of the South Downs, part of Britain’s remaining archipelagos, pores over the archives of the early twenty-first century, captivated by the freedoms and possibilities of human life at its zenith.
When he stumbles across a clue that may lead to the great lost poem, revelations of entangled love and a brutal crime emerge, destroying his assumptions about a story he thought he knew intimately.
What We Can Know is a masterpiece that reclaims the present from our sense of looming catastrophe, and imagines a future world where all is not quite lost.
Helen says: DNF
This is definitely our most highbrow read of the month. I am ashamed to say that I couldn’t get through it. I tried desperately, but only made it to page 60. Over my head? Is the author a blowhard? I have enjoyed his books in the past, but not this one.
Holly says:🤓🤓🤓1/2
This is not an easy read; it is actually quite complicated. Post-apocalyptic setting – literary intellectuals (not the most respected people in post-apocalyptic society) are looking for a lost poem and speculating on the author, his wife, their friends and all who were present for the initial reading of the poem. The first part of the book is quite slow and difficult, but as the story unfolds and the true lives of the characters emerge, the book becomes much more interesting. From a historical perspective. I believe that McEwan is telling us that we really know very little about the true personalities and daily lives of those who came before us. As speculators, we create the narrative.
Helen and Holly Hit the Books 