Book Review: Leave The World Behind
21/01/2020
Book Review | Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
I have no idea what genre Leave The World Behind is except the ‘excellent novel’ genre that I now hereby award it. I read this for January’s Chapter Chat Book Club but even before that it was already on my list. I usually try to avoid buying hardbacks but a combination of the Waterstones sale and a compulsion to scouring Bookstagram meant that the end of 2020 saw me spending money I had not yet earned on a large stack of new releases. I would, however, argue that it was totally worth it just for these sprayed pages.
There’s something totally readable about Leave The World Behind (We will call is LTWB for the remainder of this post). The chapters are short and sharp, the situation constantly evolving and the narrative voice switches between each character and a sort of omniscient voice which drops in hints about what’s happening in the world beyond the single house the story is set in. I read my first Stephen King last year which was scary, as was anticipated. With LTWB though I had a totally different experience and I think this is partly down to fact that it’s not strictly marketed as horror in the way a King book is, but rather as a literary thriller. This book however frightened the life out of me. I’m not saying this is all Rumaan Alam’s fault (there is a pandemic going on after all) but there are moments in the book that simply thinking about - a week after I finished reading it - can still send my anxiety levels spiking.
The story is set over the course of a few days. Amanda, Clay and their two children Archie and Rose, rent an AirBnB on Long Island, a beautiful house sequestered deep in the forest and totally cut off from the rest of the world (no phone signal etc.). For the first couple of days they have a perfect vacation, the family bonding, the parents shaking off the stress of everyday life, and they enjoy pretending they could really be the owners of such a wonderful house. Then late one night a couple (Ruth and GH) appear at the door, claim they are the owners of the property and ask if they too can stay as ‘something strange’ is happening in New York City. Immediately questions arise: How can Amanda and Clay be sure these people are who they say they are? Are they suspicious because the situation is strange or because they are White and the new couple are Black? What is actually happening in NYC? Reports of blackouts flash up on Amanda’s phone, confirming at least some of the couple’s story, and then suddenly their TV and Wifi no longer work, leaving these strangers together in a house and cut off from the rest of the world.
The most effective aspect of the novel for me is the constant undercurrent of unease and tension that Alam creates. The world he’s built is so similar to the one most of us generally inhabit, aspirational even, so it stands that the cracks that begin appearing, the strange events that occur, seem totally realistic and possible both in the book and right here in our own world. The characters themselves have so little information that they have to decide if these things are portents or if they’re just being paranoid. We the readers have a little more information, this narrative voice that regales us with snippets of calamitous scenes happening in the real world, letting us know that something serious is happening, so allowing us to judge the decisions the families make. Again, the events we read about are tragic but totally believable. As someone who overcame a lift phobia whilst living in New York, I personally can’t stop thinking about the dry cleaning man Alam describes who is stuck in the lift when the blackout hits and dies there, days later.
In hindsight this may not have been the ideal book for me to read, particularly at this time. As someone who regularly attributes a strange noise or occurrence to a likely apocalypse and regularly fears staying in strange places alone due to the possibility of being cut off from other humans, I am now seeing the error of my ways. Let me therefore, having taken this fall for you, suggest that you yourself work out whether you wish to engage in explorations of our civilisation’s current and potential dilemmas right now.
While the novel is firmly rooted in reality there are moments, later on, where things seems a little more surreal, although again there are potential explanations for everything if you look for them. Alam covers so many topics in one novel that, after 90 minutes of book club discussion, it still felt like there was much more to say. I think there’s loads I won’t write here - both to avoid spoilers and just to keep this a reasonable length. The issue of race was ever present, constantly referenced in terms of how the couples saw each other and also in how they handled the situation at hand. Money was also an important matter, both in terms of how it changed the dynamic once again between the couples but also in regards to how its value altered as the situation progressed. For me, context is hugely important to how I see myself. Who I’m with, where I am, what my role is: I’m dependent on these things, as most people are, to know who I am and how to behave. I loved how, at the very point that Alam is discussing all these issues, much of the context that dictates how important they are is crumbling away.
The final thing I’ll mention is how much I loved the language Alam used. I don’t consider myself someone who enjoys a great deal of description but I do love reading about food and I could have read his description of Amanda’s supermarket trip and pasta recipe all day. He uses language in such a strange, forceful way which is most notable when he describes people. He’s so detailed about their bodies and I regularly winced at the descriptions of sex, sweat, puberty and illness because it was so often extremely visceral. I found it unpleasant most of the time to be honest, although it’s possible I’m being prudish, but I still couldn’t stop reading and feeling something as I read it.
My one and only complaint about the book is the ending. Naturally I won’t disclose what happens except to say that I found it disappointing and, although I appreciate his options were limited in the world that he’d created, I certainly wasn’t satisfied with what he decided to do. That aside I obviously recommend it.
Also…the flamingos.
