ŷ������

** spoiler alert ** * eARC received from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review *

1.5 stars

The concept behind this novel intrigued me, which is the only reason I requested to read it. The execution of the Unmapping unfortunately reminded me of the Happening. Interesting concept, undesirable execution, and incredibly unlikable main characters. I spent the entire book wondering if Robbins wanted the reader to like Esme and Arjun? No, right? Arjun was introduced wearing a fedora. I mean, c'mon.

I found this book to be the worst I've read in a while regarding representation of female characters. We are trapped inside Esme's head for so long and her thoughts (and much of the prose in this novel) reads like Kronk's cadence when he's talking about Kuzco's poison. Y'know, "Oh, right, the poison. The poison for Kuzco. The poison specifically chosen to kill Kuzco. Kuzco's poison". Esme thinks in repetitive fragments and 99.98% of those thoughts are about Marcus. I honestly started to think a) Marcus wasn't real and b) Esme's own thoughts wouldn't pass the Bechdel test. She obsessed over him so much I started to understand why the guy was avoiding her. Her thoughts were disturbing to read.

On top of that, Esme was full of contradictions. She expresses a like for being told what to do and says she respects the system of processing at her job when the reader has already seen her tell several people how to do their own jobs and she has no respect for the chain of command. What was the reason?

In terms of other female characters: we get the woman who missed her date with Rick. Broke with no phone, she's still just thinking about this missed date with a guy she's never met in person. Then we have the mayor obsessing over the guy she's having an affair with. We also have the wife of a doomsday prepper, you guessed it, obsessing over when her husband will return. There was not a single woman in this novel worthy of me rooting for them.

Arjun is a concerning portrayal of a mentally unwell character. The world (lbr, New York mainly) is falling apart and he's obsessing over a crush. It adds to my chief issue with this book: nothing feels real.

I thought this was meant to show that civilians tend to downplay disaster until it's too late and instead they focus on trivial things like workplace romance. But, when that's SO much of the novel, the disaster takes a serious backseat. It just didn't make for interesting or entertaining reading.

The only part of this I found somewhat interesting was the story of the kid trapped under (in?) a building. If the entire story centered around that perhaps as a representation of how the city's planning for emergencies completely broke down, maybe I would've found this more interesting. Instead, this novel feels like when someone's trying to tell you a story and they just keep going down tangents to explain about the parents and hobbies of random people you've never heard of nor care about.

It just felt like messy story telling. I acknowledge this writing style is 100% not my favorite so that added to me enjoying this a lot less than others. There are also people that found Esme and Arjun likable, so this is one of those books that I found incredibly unenjoyable, but that others seem to love. Not a recommend from me, but it might be someone else's favorite book.