TC Boyles' 2023 novel feels like an extension of his 2000 novel "A Friend of the Earth" set in 2025 with the absurdity of the state of Florida thrown in. The matriarch mother tries to hold the dysfunctional daughter and the wondering son together in the Anthropocene world under total destruction. The story is set in the Santa Ynez Valley with extreme heat, winds and fires, along with the heat, rain and flooding of the Florida coast. The daughter lacks considerable common sense and is an alcoholic. The son is uncommitted and bitter with the state of earth and the loss of his arm. The daughter incredibly purchases an invasive Burmese Python that ends up killing one of her twins, because she can. As the owner says, "owning a snake is a basic Constitutional guarantee-life, liberty, and happiness, right?"
The book is very depressing and the humor is very black. Even with the butterflies on the last page, the author offers little hope. I hope his imagination is wrong and that mankind will change.
