A review by nuevecuervos
The Abyss Surrounds Us, by Emily Skrutskie
3.0
I have so many thoughts about this book. First, I picked it up on audiobook because I had just seen the description of it and thought it might be something my kid might want to listen to on a relatively long drive we had ahead of us (don't look at me like that-- the hubs ended up playing a Harry Dresden book for her instead; I'm not the only one contributing to her literary delinquency). Unfortunately, as advanced a plothound as my kid can be, she cannot handle the idea of animals being injured, so we only made it about forty minutes in before she asked that we switch to something else pretty much immediately. Fair, it was distressing. So I listened to the rest alone, and though I enjoyed this tale of Stockholm syndrome a lot, I walked away feeling like I wasn't entirely in our protagonist's corner all the time.
It's interesting--I was talking through the dilemma in which Cass finds herself embroiled, and I as a grown-ass adult couldn't find a more morally acceptable way out aside from killing herself, either, but somehow I'm still out here judging her 17-year-old ass, lol. At least, this feeling held until the point at which Cass begins making decisions on her own and suddenly sees the pirate ship as something that needs to be protected, actively seeking to do so by killing others in the process. Certainly, we have to chalk it up to her changed mentality, and her reasoning behind seeing much of the pirate crew as innocents that need to be protected is worked through really well. So maybe it's just that Skrutskie is expertly tapping into an ethical Kobyashi Maru with which there is no winning. Hard questions plague Cass, too, though it's maddening that by the end, she should think herself Seventeen, amirite? (Insert Jeanie Bueller 'kids' gif here :D ) (yes, I went looking; no i couldn't find the right one, but yes, you old bastards like me know exactly what I'm talking about)
Of interest, should a reader spend time considering Cass' moral predicament (as one no doubt must in the wake of her decisions), there's room to be left spinning into questions of, how ethical is it to steal bread when you're starving? Eggs? A whole goat? A whole hot dog cart? A cruise ship's worth of spoils? Shouldn't we be focusing on the ethics of a society that lets its members get so hungry they have to steal or die? Or do we chalk it up to maybe there will always be fringe elements of a mostly-functioning society? We do get hints that the smaller, more ostensibly improved governments aren't all they're cracked up to be, but maybe we need more; maybe we'll get it in a sequel. Anyway. More than popcorn book, though it doesn't feel like it at the time.
Spoiler
the scene where Cass's original Reckoner meets a gruesome end andIt's interesting--I was talking through the dilemma in which Cass finds herself embroiled, and I as a grown-ass adult couldn't find a more morally acceptable way out aside from killing herself, either, but somehow I'm still out here judging her 17-year-old ass, lol. At least, this feeling held until the point at which Cass begins making decisions on her own and suddenly sees the pirate ship as something that needs to be protected, actively seeking to do so by killing others in the process. Certainly, we have to chalk it up to her changed mentality, and her reasoning behind seeing much of the pirate crew as innocents that need to be protected is worked through really well. So maybe it's just that Skrutskie is expertly tapping into an ethical Kobyashi Maru with which there is no winning. Hard questions plague Cass, too, though it's maddening that by the end, she should think herself
Spoiler
a monster, but then be so judgily angry at Swift for having also been a monster doing monster shit that Cass herself *just fucking did* in killing Reckoners who are just doing their job. And! That in the process of thinking it out, she should decide that piracy is the way to figure out what is rotten about her society.Of interest, should a reader spend time considering Cass' moral predicament (as one no doubt must in the wake of her decisions), there's room to be left spinning into questions of, how ethical is it to steal bread when you're starving? Eggs? A whole goat? A whole hot dog cart? A cruise ship's worth of spoils? Shouldn't we be focusing on the ethics of a society that lets its members get so hungry they have to steal or die? Or do we chalk it up to maybe there will always be fringe elements of a mostly-functioning society? We do get hints that the smaller, more ostensibly improved governments aren't all they're cracked up to be, but maybe we need more; maybe we'll get it in a sequel. Anyway. More than popcorn book, though it doesn't feel like it at the time.