The Snow (Gollancz S.F.) (Paperback)

By concentrating on only two main characters, and splitting the "action" equally between their present-day troubles on the snow and their lives before the world changed, Roberts builds complete lives for his protagonists, and I found it very easy to care about what happens to them (though they are both far from sympathetic !).

For my money, the underlying plot (where did all this snow come from?) takes a backseat to the pervading sense of loss, as everything and everyone the survivors ever knew is buried beneath miles of snow. Not buried and gone, but buried and "still there" ; frozen but whole, untouchably distant. There is a well thought-out and interesting ending/explanation, but that is not really what the book is all about.

Not a lot happens, in truth. But this is a book that cries out to be read s-l-o-w-l-y, to let your mind wander, to think about your loved ones and what it would be like to leave them buried in a preserved world, miles under your feet. For a novel that is set under a blue sky, with a blank white horizon at every turn, I actually felt quite claustrophobic reading it.

That said I did like the story the Snow itself was cool, a plausible enough disaster scenario and was nicely delt with to start with. There where several big questions that the author never really tackled, like why the Americans felt the need to come over to the UK and start a city over London, how the snow miner machines worked, and how they managed to get planes above the snow, that said I didn't really mind those questions as the author gave enough explainations about his new world to keep it feeling real.

On the debate about the characters I liked Tira the 1st protagonist we where introduced to, they way she behaved seemed real to me as she came across as someone who was in shock and was just riding events. Far more a viewpoint than someone who did things or changed things. However I felt that [Blank] Fred the second character was more than a bit cardboard, this was annoying as he was a doer / victim (it was the victim but that really bugged me). This came to a head towards the end of the novel when he becomes vital to the story, and I just wanted him dead as he annoyed me so much.

Talking about the ending to this book, it came at me from so far out of the left feild that it left me cold when it hit. I just wish we had had some forewarning, I don't think it would have taken a lot, or spoilt the suprise if the possibility of this ending had been floated earlier in the book, even if done in a madman speach. That said once the shock had left and I re-engaged with the book I was left really enjoying the last couple of chapters. All in all I did enjoy this book and hope that the Author improves in the future, but I can't help but think the signing endorsements from critics and other authors might stop Mr Roberts from really looking at where he could improve in the future.