Teaser

In the near future, following a series of crises, beachcombers scour the Channel looking for alien relics that can be sold for a profit. But with everything slowly falling apart, what hope is there for the future . . ?

Review

M. John Harrison has written a lot of books. Most of them fall somewhere into the fantasy-science fiction spectrum. He’s even written space opera, despite declaring no real love for the genre. He’s on the Gollancz SF Masterworks list, and has cropped up on several award shortlists. Despite this, there is a very large crowd of people who don’t believe he’s getting the acclaim he deserves. Why? Because SF is something to be looked down on, of course. Because serious writers wouldn’t dare write about such frivolous topics as the future. The End of Everything has already been touted by some people as the best – nay, the definitive – book of 2026. Obviously I was going to read it. But embarking on my first journey with Harrison turned out to be an underwhelming experience. Why? Because while the high literati might look down on genre fiction, that distrust goes both ways. Make no mistake, the trappings of SF are here, but this is very much literary fiction.

I would comfortably lump Harrison into the China Mieville school of writing SF. He is a writer for other writers, and one who seemingly has no interest in having his readership understand what they’re looking at. Happy to play with SF’s toys, but ultimately more interested in writing good sentences than in telling compelling stories. I’m not going to say that M. John Harrison is a bad writer. He isn’t. His sentences flow magnificently. It’s just that they fail to cohere into anything more impactful when viewed as part of a novel.

What is The End of Everything about? I’ve read the book, and I still couldn’t tell you. To be honest, I don’t think we’re supposed to care about things like plot or narrative. We’re supposed to sit back and say ‘wow, wasn’t that strange.’ Harrison isn’t telling us a story. He’s selling us an experience. That experience being of people disconnected from society living in near-future England. There might have been an alien invasion. Or a shift in reality. There are beings called the iGhetti, but they’re up north in London and barely feature. Many things are hinted at, but nothing is ever made clear. There are alien relics in the sea that may or may not be sentient. Europe may or may not be a nicer place. The world may or may not still be ending. It’s hard to tell, because Harrison has no interest in telling us anything, and only ever shows us hints through a heavily tinted lens.

Word by word, and sentence by sentence, The End of Everything is charming enough. It’s very readable. Events unfold in a pleasingly dreamlike state. At one point, a young child is murdered, and people simply shrug and go back to their lives. Not because this is a brutal dystopia, but because the book has no interest in showing us consequences. The main character is dropped early on, and instead we follow someone else. No fuss is made of this. Sometimes we get diary extracts, but even within a single chapter they are so untethered form any sense of linearity as to be maddening. At no point does the book cohere into anything more than some nicely written sentences.

I can see why people might enjoy this. Even my miserly self didn’t hate it. I fully expect it to appear on awards shortlists next year. My university lecturers who so despised SF as a matter of principle would probably fall over themselves in a bid to praise the mysticism of this literary masterpiece. Oh, how clever the author is. Oh, how beautiful the prose. Oh, such mastery of the uncanny. But a book is more than just a collection of words. A story is more than just a vague feeling of unease.

No, I didn’t hate The End of Everything. Nor did I enjoy it. Like the tide, it washed right over me, pleasant in the moment, but ultimately leaving no lasting impressions.

Book Stats

• A Standalone Novel
• First Published 2026
• 198 Pages