The Trees

June 27, 2016
In Shaw’s (The Girl with Glass Feet) atmospheric modern fairy tale, Adrien Thomas prefers to sit on the sidelines and watch life go by until trees begin suddenly pushing up from the ground. Adrien walks outside to find England in ruins; the trees have killed numerous people (usually impaling them on their branches) and completely destroyed civilization’s infrastructure. When he meets Hannah and her teen son, Seb, they set out to find her brother, Zach, a park ranger, and if possible, get to Ireland to find Adrien’s wife, Michelle, who is on a business trip. Along the way they meet Inoue Hiroko, a girl who proves handy with a slingshot; meanwhile, Adrien repeatedly glimpses tiny creatures constructed of forest detritus. Shaw offers a postapocalyptic world where the woods reign, described in lush, evocative prose, and characters that shine. During the journey, Adrien finds within himself a courage that he never thought possible, and Hannah begins to see nature in an entirely different way. It’s a coming-of-age for Seb, and a chance to bond with his mother, while the enigmatic Hiroko battles her own demons. This stunning exploration of love, hope, and the wildness inside us all will have readers enchanted from the first page. Agent: Susan Armstrong, Conville & Walsh Literary Agency.

August 1, 2016

On the night Nature decides it's had enough, Adrien Thomas is nearly skewered in his bed by trees sprouting up through his house. All over the world, trees are killing millions and destroying everything standing in their way. Survivors like Hannah have the skills to navigate the new world. She plans to take her son, Sebastian, and hike out to her forester brother's home to start new lives. They invite Adrien along after he mentions that his wife, Michelle, is in Ireland, assuming he will attempt to locate her and will be traveling in the same direction. Now he must find the courage, heart, and fortitude for this quest. Nature isn't finished with humanity either. It's searching for something or someone, and Adrien is one who will be tested. VERDICT Shaw (The Girl with Glass Feet) has written an exciting apocalyptic novel that blends in elements of magic realism. Gripping and occasionally brutal, this survival story highlights both the best and worst in humanity.--Karin Thogersen, Huntley Area P.L., IL

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 1, 2016
An ecological sermon, bildungsroman, mystery, fairy tale, and horror story all combined into a novel about an improbable journey.This book changes on you, quickly and constantly. It begins as a trite ecological fairy tale with simplistic dialogue and then suddenly pulls you into a world where direction shifts and the fear or euphoria you felt while reading the initial pages--depending on your political bent regarding humanity's impact on nature--becomes much more complex and edgy. The writing evolves into something substantial. Ex-schoolteacher Adrien Thomas, rudderless and self-loathing, is full of angst about his wife Michelle's business trip to Ireland. Suddenly the Earth erupts with trees, breaking homes, buildings, streets, and society to bits, and Adrien fears he may now be separated from his wife for a very long time. He meets a woman named Hannah and her son, Seb, in the ruins of the city and they decide to travel to find Hannah's brother, Zach, a woodsman better suited for this new forest world. On their way they see that the tree apocalypse is everywhere, a world event. The journey is reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy's The Road as it turns violent and dark, not just beneath the gloaming of the tree canopy, but within each character's moral center. There's murder, survival, and a grim new order--but magical realism turns it to hope, and some surreal and mythic animals and beings in the forest help fulfill the journey. By the end, Adrien becomes something very much other than the man who started the journey in the dead of night. A big, unclassifiable novel; it's worth the effort to enter a world that is never what it appears.

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