THE BRIEF HISTORY OF THE DEAD

I read Kevin Brockmeier's first novel, The Truth About Celia, early last year and really liked it. It combined beautiful writing with a heartbreaking and completely cool idea. More importantly, it guaranteed that I would read more of his work. I haven't gotten around to his story collection yet but I did grab his latest novel, The Brief History of the Dead, as soon as it came out.

The novel alternates chapters between the denizens of a city which appears to be the place you go when you die and the story of a woman trying to survive alone in Antarctica, who may also be the last person left alive on Earth. That's right, it appears a plague has swept across the globe and the carrier was Coca-Cola. Why Coke? Because the water supply in the future isn't safe enough. And why is Laura Byrd at the South Pole? A marketing project for Coca-Cola.

There are many links link that between the characters in the book, especially when it becomes obvious what the remaining denizens of the City have in common. The chapters set in the afterworld focus on different characters and we get glimpses of their lives both in the "real world" and now. Those people do appear in the background in other chapters, of course.

The language and writing and wonderful throughout the book, with themes and ideas pinging back and forth between the more metaphysical City chapters and the more adventure-oriented chapters of Laura Byrd's trek across the ice. It's official: I like Kevin Brockmeier's work and I think you will too.