The Locust Tide

LoveReading Says

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Set in an imagined version of Britain that feels entirely, and chillingly, plausible in our age of escalating natural disasters, JE Broom’s The Locust Tide is a compelling blend of thought-provoking climate fiction and family drama. Readers are thrust into this dystopian new world through the sharply-focussed lens of 24-year-old Elouise, whose involving first-person narrative drives much of the novel.

Following the death of her mother, Elouise is all-but alone in the world. Relocated to Newtown, a town for the “climate-displaced” that’s been hailed “an ecological masterpiece”, she refers to the place as Toytown (“Shining and man-made, it was a beacon of hope and despair all in one”), and lives from one weekly quota of social credits to the next, until the arrival of a mysterious envelope changes everything.

Inside the package Elouise finds a set of papers titled The Locust Tides, “Adapting and living with our changing environment.. A new model of sustainable community within a framework of redefined social rights and responsibilities.” The document is authored by SF Thomas, whom Elouise realises was her maternal grandmother — a woman who experienced a terrible flood as a young girl when The Wall failed to hold back the water.

A woman Elouise’s mother consistently evaded talking about. As Elouise works to unearth the truth about her grandmother, the past and present collide in both a personal and political sense, with The Locust Tide exploring the theme of self-preservation versus social responsibility through an overarching twisty mystery.

As such, it comes recommended for readers who enjoy meaty climate fiction, and meatier family sagas.

Joanne Owen, A LoveReading Ambassador

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