The Ship

“I was born at the end of the world” is how 16-year-old Lalla Paul of London begins her story. Though civilization is rapidly dying around her, her parents—mainly her wealthy and connected father, Michael, inventor of a major computer network censorship tool—manage to keep her sheltered from the worst of it. Michael has a plan in the form of a ship that’s large enough to carry them and 500 others, along with years’ worth of supplies, out to sea and safety. But once aboard the ship, Lalla is traumatized by tragedy, unsettled by her father’s slow transformation into a messianic figure, overwhelmed by love, and concerned about the long-term prospects for survival. Honeywell’s lyrical descriptions of Lalla’s thoughts and the ship itself are haunting, and quite grim when Lalla questions their plans and her father’s influence. But Lalla’s adolescent vacillating about different aspects of ship life can get tiresome, and the reader might eventually sympathize with the characters who are frustrated by her. This mixed bag of beauty and vexation has a gut-twisting epilogue that will appeal to lovers of psychological speculative fiction. (Apr.)