Driftwood
By: Marie Brennan
Website: https://www.swantower.com/
Release Date: August 14th, 2020
Publisher: Tachyon Publications
Rating:

I don’t know what I expected when I saw this lovely ARC on NetGalley. The concept was interesting and I liked the idea behind it but I’m not sure I was ready for the purely amazing read this book was.

The world of Driftwood is a strange place — it is where worlds come to die and as entire worlds are shrunk down in size and people are disappearing left and right everything is slowly coming to an end. Think of Driftwood as a story of a post-apocalyptic world…but with some of the worlds still in the middle of their own end. If you’re looking for an amazing fantasy read, be on the lookout for Driftwood which comes out August 14th, 2020. If you want to know more about the story and my reaction, read on but please be aware there may be tiny spoilers.

As I said, Driftwood is strange. Continents become neighborhoods, entire races are wiped out and soon everything is destroyed by The Crush. In Driftwood there is one figure that exists in whispers and rumor, in tales of supposed immortality and vast knowledge, the guide they call Last. But then, new rumors spread. Last is dead.

Drifters from across the disconnected worlds come together to remember Last, to tell the tales of the impossible guide that outlived everyone and to try and make sense of who he really was.

The style of this book was difficult to adjust to but once I did I was obsessed. Instead of a steady stream of a beginning, middle and end, we learn about Last through the stories of the Drifters, as if it’s a collection of stories, as if we’re all sitting there with the crowd, hearing the tales.

The tales told give us insight to those speaking about Last but also in regards to their own worlds, their story and their character. The stories told are often glimpses into the world of Last, in small but extremely deep and insightful ways. Last doesn’t want to provide false hope and yet he cannot help but hope himself. In a world where everything is literally falling apart it was endearing and astonishing to see how many came to Last looking for salvation and how many ways Last did his best to help.

In the spirit of not giving it all away I’ll stop here. Between the extremely original world building, effective story telling and fantastic writing I was spellbound by Driftwood. Thank you NetGalley, Tachyon Publications and Marie Brennan for the opportunity to read the ARC!