I recently checked Leave the World Behind out from my local library’s e-book app. Marin Ireland is one of my favorite narrators, and the premise sounded interesting enough. The book was available to download, so I jumped right in. It was perfect Friday night entertainment.
A middle class couple and their two children rent an air b&b just far enough outside the city to feel like they’re away from it all. The house is beautiful, with a pool, and they’ve filled the house with easy to make vacation food, and are enjoying a relaxing week away.
A couple of days into their stay, a couple comes to the door and tells them that this is their house and they’ve come to stay because of a blackout in NYC. Their story checks out and the two families share the home over the next few days when they try to understand what exactly is going on in the world.
Over the next few days, during the awkwardness of them living together and being cut off from the rest of the world, they witness large packs of animals migrating far away. All communications are cut off, and they hear very loud strange sounds. As the children begin to get sick, they decide whether it’s safe or not to go to a hospital.
The dynamics at play in the house are class, race, age, and income – the couples would never naturally meet or be friends. When we are afraid, is it better to focus on self-preservation to the exclusion of the others? Is that rude? Should we stick together? Should we sacrifice our resources for these strangers in our home? Should we leave the vacation house and chance going back to the city, surely in chaos?
As the story goes on, we are given more and more clues as to what might have caused this blackout and what the outcome is going to be, but it is ambiguous and throughout the entire book you’re left guessing. Personally, I love that type of story.
I loved that the characters are morally ambiguous, that their ethics and morals are tested over and over, that the children are imperfect and the parents are imperfect, and while all of this external pressure is on them, they all behave in ways that seem entirely plausible and that the reader can identify with. I loved the book, and I gave it four stars. You should read it!
The Netflix movie: Leave the World Behind
The reviews of the Netflix movie based on this book deem it a flop. I understand why this book wouldn’t translate well to the screen, because so many events and so much behavior is based on internal conflict. My suggestion is to read the book and skip the movie. The book’s always better, anyway.
Publisher’s Summary
From the bestselling author of Rich and Pretty comes a suspenseful and provocative novel keenly attuned to the complexities of parenthood, race, and class. Leave the World Behind explores how our closest bonds are reshaped—and unexpected new ones are forged—in moments of crisis.
Amanda and Clay head out to a remote corner of Long Island expecting a vacation: a quiet reprieve from life in New York City, quality time with their teenage son and daughter, and a taste of the good life in the luxurious home they’ve rented for the week. But a late-night knock on the door breaks the spell. Ruth and G. H. are an older couple—it’s their house, and they’ve arrived in a panic. They bring the news that a sudden blackout has swept the city. But in this rural area—with the TV and internet now down, and no cell phone service—it’s hard to know what to believe.
Should Amanda and Clay trust this couple—and vice versa? What happened back in New York? Is the vacation home, isolated from civilization, a truly safe place for their families? And are they safe from one other?
Book Club Questions for Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
- The renters of the home are a middle class white couple with small children. The owners are an older African-American couple who are wealthy and have adult children. How did this dynamic affect the behavior of the two couples? Did the children seem to be affected?
- Fear of the unknown is a major driver of the way the adults and children behaved. How does each character’s response to uncertainty reflect their personality and background?
- Amanda’s initial reaction to the couple at the door is almost visceral. She’s resentful and defensive, while her husband is more inclined to be nice and accommodating. Is that a reversal of usual gender roles? Why do they react the way they do?
- What are your thoughts about Rose? She is depicted as whiny and entitled, but as the book ends, we see her in a totally new light. Why do you think she went in search of people on her own and without telling anyone?
- The woman on the road that spoke Spanish – what was her role in Clay’s story?
- Throughout the entire novel, there is ambiguity and uncertainty surrounding what is happening. How did this uncertainty impact your reading experience, and what do you think Rumaan Alam intended by leaving what exactly happened to our imaginations?
- Did any of the book’s events cause you to examine your own preparation for a catastrophic event or a complete loss of communication with the outside world?
- The dynamic between the two couples: One is the owner, one is the renter and current occupant = caused a lot of awkwardness. For example, Ruth’s reaction to the dirty dishes in the kitchen. How would you react in either couple’s situation? As the guest who has the first right of use or the owner who is a guest in their own home?
- Amanda and Clay get into the hot tub nude, lounging around naked. G.H. Washington comes out and just talks like nothing weird is going on and joins Amanda. What caused them to behave this way?
- What do you think caused the noise? What caused the sickness? Before Archie gets sick, he gets a tick bite. That can explain the fever but then his tooth falls out – as we learn later, many people lose teeth. Was the tick bite relevant or part of the ambiguity of the plot?
- Who is your favorite character in this book? Who did you like the least?
- What do you think happened next?
Leave the World Behind Explained
A book like Leave the World Behind ends in an ambiguous manner on purpose. The author is further immersing you into the story because you, like the main characters, don’t exactly know what is going on. You have only the information that the characters have, and that increases the amount of suspense you feel while you’re reading the book.
A great example of this is the tick bite that Archie gets while he’s out with Rose in the woods. When he gets sick later, we’re thinking – it’s the tick bite! We think we know what’s going on and that we have more information than Archie’s mother, right until his teeth start falling out. That’s not a symptom of a tick bite, right? We could google it, but the characters in the book can’t. It’s a great way of keeping you turning those pages and I love to read books like that.
Life is a lot like a book with an ambiguous ending. We don’t know how it’s going to end, but the journey is pretty damn fascinating, isn’t it?
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
