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Start giftingThe Book of Flora
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Learn moreIn this Philip K. Dick Award–winning series, one woman’s unknowable destiny depends on a bold new step in human evolution.
In the wake of the apocalypse, Flora has come of age in a highly gendered post-plague society where females have become a precious, coveted, hunted, and endangered commodity. But Flora does not participate in the economy that trades in bodies. An anathema in a world that prizes procreation above all else, she is an outsider everywhere she goes, including the thriving all-female city of Shy.
Now navigating a blighted landscape, Flora, her friends, and a sullen young slave she adopts as her own child leave their oppressive pasts behind to find their place in the world. They seek refuge aboard a ship where gender is fluid, where the dynamic is uneasy, and where rumors flow of a bold new reproductive strategy.
When the promise of a miraculous hope for humanity’s future tears Flora’s makeshift family asunder, she must choose: protect the safe haven she’s built or risk everything to defy oppression, whatever its provenance.
Meg Elison is a high school dropout and a graduate of UC Berkeley. She is the author of The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, winner of the 2014 Philip K. Dick Award, and The Book of Etta. The Book of Flora is the third novel in the Road to Nowhere trilogy. The author lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and writes like she’s running out of time. For more information, visit www.megelison.com.
Reviews
“This grim, poetic conclusion to Elison’s postapocalyptic Road to Nowhere trilogy widens its scope from reproductive rights to gender binaries and the consequences of stories…Elison balances complex protagonists with the slow mythologizing of their stories. As prophecies and worldviews go to war, Flora’s elegiac statement that ‘only what is remembered survives’ takes on additional relevance. This slow novel builds into an urgent, ferociously readable warning about the power of belief to maim—or heal. Readers will find this a powerful conclusion to a fascinating series.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Elison’s trilogy is a refreshing exploration of gender unique to postapocalyptic SF. Its shocking conclusion will leave readers reeling and rethinking what they know about gender identity and trauma.” —Booklist
“Alternating between the present and flashbacks, Flora’s history intertwines with those of previous characters to create an intriguing SF tale…Combining a grim, futuristic world, fascinating character relationships, and a deep exploration of gender roles and identity, the last of Elison’s Road to Nowhere trilogy offers a sound and satisfying conclusion.” —Library Journal
“What sets the Road to Nowhere trilogy apart from other literary pandemics is how Elison centers her story around reproductive rights, gender identity, and sexuality…The Book of Flora marks Elison’s growth as an author. I say this as someone who adored The Book of the Unnamed Wife, who found its freshness, its ragged edges, its radical attitude to a well-established sub-genre breathtaking. With The Book of Flora, Elison displays a confidence in how she fleshes out her wonderful characters, how she plays around with perspective and chronology, bouncing backward and forward in time, and how she ties it all together in a climax surprising, moving, and beautiful. I will miss these characters; I will miss this world.” —Locus Magazine
“This book will rock your world…A feminist dystopia unlike the others…Ellison explores themes of feminism, LGBTQ+ people’s rights, women’s rights, the commodification and governmental control of women’s bodies through the lens of expertly crafted dystopia, and a brilliant protagonist…Meg Elison is a talent, and this book is proof of that.” —Bookstr
“Bold…The series hallmarks are here, including feverish concerns about reproduction and its aftermath…The Book of Flora is a challenging and rewarding dystopia that will make you reconsider every absolute.” —Foreword Reviews
“The Road to Nowhere trilogy asks big questions about a world that’s more possible than we might imagine, and it’s a radically queer treatise on the future of sex.” —LitReactor
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