Cold People
Books | Fiction / Science Fiction / Genetic Engineering
3.7
(107)
Tom Rob Smith
* “A zany, wildly gripping, dark futuristic fantasy.” —Vogue, Most Anticipated Books of the Year * “Fascinating…a propulsive ride…through a well-built world.” —The Christian Science Monitor * From the brilliant, bestselling author of Child 44 and creator of the FX series Class of ’09 comes a “cinematic” (The Washington Post), “captivating…[and] “brilliantly conceived postapocalyptic story” (Booklist, starred review) about an Antarctic colony of global apocalypse survivors seeking to reinvent civilization under the most extreme conditions imaginable.The world has fallen. Without warning, a mysterious and omnipotent force has claimed the planet for their own. There are no negotiations, no demands, no reasons given for their actions. All they have is a message: humanity has thirty days to reach the one place on Earth where they will be allowed to exist…Antarctica. Cold People follows the perilous journeys of a handful of those who endure the frantic exodus to the most extreme environment on the planet. But their goal is not merely to survive the present. Because as they cling to life on the ice, the remnants of their past swept away, they must also confront the urgent challenge: can they change and evolve rapidly enough to ensure humanity’s future? Can they build a new society in the sub-zero cold? Original and imaginative, as profoundly intimate as it is grand in scope, Cold People is a “spellbinding…speculative masterpiece” (Library Journal, starred review) that’s “chilling in so many ways” (Los Angeles Times).
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Author
Tom Rob Smith
Pages
368
Publisher
Simon and Schuster
Published Date
2023-02-07
ISBN
1982198400 9781982198404
Community ReviewsSee all
"I love dystopian literature, and this fits the bill. Alien threats, uninhabitable climate, human beings vs the “cold people” they design and raise in labs. Residents of Earth, threatened for annihilation by aliens, are forced to leave six continents on Earth to move en masse to Antarctica. Tens of millions make it, hundreds of millions do not. Over 20 years, the human beings rebuild their society in this brutally cold climate in part by creating cold-adapted creatures borne of human women who lost children during the migration. Things do not go well when the creatures leave their ice-bound, below-surface labs. If you appreciate books like Station Eleven and Dr Moreau or movies like The Thing and Day After Tomorrow, you’ll like this. "
Diane Morello
"The mass chaos and pandemonium in the beginning of the story were quite compelling. The author did a great job creating a sense of panic, dread, and claustrophobia. The new Antarctic society was very believable. I felt the sense of hopelessness but also the enduring perseverance of their survival instincts. The story really moved me since it felt so real and immersive. But as the story developed, it seemed to take a dramatic turn. The end-game of the narrative felt rather jarring and left me feeling confused. It was almost like reading 2 different books. The things and people I cared about from the beginning/mid of the story seem to get left behind. I was left wondering what happened to them, how they felt about certain events, and how those events would affect them moving forward. Certain developments appeared but never come up again accomplishing virtually nothing. I expected certain characters to play significant roles in the events that transpired (as I’m sure the author intended) but they ultimately felt inconsequential. All in all, the beginning and middle of the novel were entertaining and immersive but the ending seemed to diverge the story into something far less believable and out of left field. "
Lumpy
"Interesting plot line but execution was not 100%"
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Nadia Coughlan
"This book, aside from having such an interesting premise and really pulling me in, was a beautifully-written thesis about the human condition.<br/><br/>Some of my favorite questions I explored while reading were: what keeps people going? What does love feel like, and how does it act? How would I choose to act in the most extreme and dire of circumstances? How do people change when pushed to their breaking point? How do I feel about genetic mutations when considering human species’ survival versus human compassion’s survival? <br/><br/>Overall this book was so different than anything I’ve ever read but I’m happy to say I really enjoyed it. I would recommend to anyone interested in a sci-fi dystopian work that takes a close look at what makes humans human. Thank you to the “Currently Reading” podcast for the rec!!<br/>"
Olivia Cook
