The End of Men

Author: Christina Sweeney-Baird
Published by: Borough Press
Pages: 407
Format: Hardback
My Rating ★★★★

Only men carry the virus. Only women can save us.

Glasgow, 2025. Dr Amanda Maclean is called to treat a young man with a mild fever. Within three hours he dies. The mysterious illness sweeps through the hospital with deadly speed. This is how it begins.

The victims are all men.
​
Dr Maclean raises the alarm, but the sickness spreads to every corner of the globe. Threatening families. Governments. Countries.
Can they find a cure before it's too late? Will this be the story of the end of the world - or its salvation?

My thoughts:
 
The End of Men chronicles the fictional events of 2025–2031 as a virulent pandemic sweeps across the world and decimates the male population. We follow over a dozen interweaving point of views, each illustrating how the world reels and comes to terms in all its realms—in love, economics, politics, medicine; we watch as this world rebuilds. 
 
The impact worldwide is interesting as women have to fill all kinds of roles, from refuse collectors to soldiers and world leaders. Especially thought provoking is the drastic action some countries take to protect male babies and how sperm is allocated to ensure the populations future. The parts about governments figuring out ways to cope with the effects of the Plague were also really interesting to me and added even more depth to the story.
 
As the book progressed and the individual storylines interwove there became a clear recurrent focus on Amanda’s and Catherine’s plots. They had the strongest narratives. However, outside Catherine and Amanda’s chapters; there were also some really memorable minor characters: Morven, a Scottish former hostel owner; Rosamie, a Filipino nanny; Helen, a mother of three girls; and Lisa, a virology professor.
 
 I especially liked Morven because I found her particular set of circumstances so interesting and realistic. Living on a rural farm in Scotland, she and her family are well-equipped and almost entirely self-sufficient. When the Plague hits, they simply hope to keep their heads down and get through it, remaining on the farm and being extremely cautious with their day-to-day activities. She is desperate to keep her husband and son safe. But things become more complicated when the family are forced into hosting a large number of young men who have been evacuated from their homes.  
 
 
I really enjoyed the format of the book, and although there are a lot of characters, the author clearly explores the dramatic escalation into fear and chaos that this pandemic brings across the continents. 
 
The novel is extremely well written, and the style is engaging. It clearly shows the devastating and overwhelming pain and sadness of loss. It’s moving and poignant as the author humanises the victims. It’s impossible not to care about these people and their fates. Some characters are very reflective especially on life pre-pandemic which is heart breaking. I found the whole thing extremely moving and at times it was very difficult to drag myself away.
 
I thought it would be draining to read a book about a pandemic, but the opposite actually occurred. Even though it was strange to read  such a dark fiction book which currently reflects real life in many ways, I felt as though I got a glimpse into an even more terrifying, dystopic reality. I was able to say, “Things are bad right now, but at least they’re not this bad.”
 
The End of Men is well worth your time. Go check it out. Thank you to Borough Press and Harper Collins for kindly sending me out a copy of the hardback to read and review.
 
Overall reaction: