Leave the World Behind - Rumaan Alam

Genre - Dystopia

For a long time - probably around the time of Hunger Games - I was reading so many dystopian novels. These were the kinds of books my student readers wanted - so in the spirit of collection development and book talks, I read and read. When the trend ended, I took a bit of a break. I have since read some adult dystopias, and my most recent is National Book Award Finalist Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam at the recommendation of a friend. An urban family is escaping to a rental house for a beach getaway. They are surprised when the homeowners arrive in the middle of the night citing a black out in New York City. With some reservations, Amanda and Clay agree to allow George and Ruth to stay, especially after they offer a partial refund. Strange things are happening. Animals seem to be gathering in the woods. Internet connectivity is sketchy to nonexistent. Piercing sounds nearly disable them. Suspense builds as tension builds among the residents in the house.

The tension and the mystery surrounding these characters kept me reading avidly. I’m not sure that I was fully grasping what was happening in the outer world, but that didn’t really matter. Actually for this reader, the lack of detail made the plot easier to believe, more difficult to criticize. The fear among the characters was palpable. What would we do if we couldn’t google on our phones to find out what was going on in the world? How would we react if we were essentially trapped with strangers - neither family trusting the other? Do we trust others or isolate? How do we protect our children - from fear, from disease? How well do we know even people we think we know? These questions are just some of what these characters must address.

Mostly this title left me unsettled - perhaps as intended I’d say. I was not surprised that it was composed in 2020 - a time of much uncertainty in the world. In retrospect, I’m not sure as a culture we have done much to improve in the areas where weaknesses were evident during this time. I pondered the questions raised by the novel for a time, but I am not quite in the place to spend much time in the uncertainty of it. Just as an aside - I did follow up the reading of Rumaan Alam’s Leave the World Behind with the Netflix movie. For me as per usual, the book was better but both were certainly unsettling and thought provoking, highlighting the importance of art and artists in confronting the world in which we live.