Book • Review
The Impossible Resurrection of Grief
Octavia Cade
Out May 20, 2021
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I have included the Goodreads description as I feel it is important to understand for my review.

“Can you watch something die and let it die? The answer, too often, was yes.”

The Impossible Resurrection of Grief is a strange novella, that would be offensive if it weren’t gleaming with sharp truth.
While ultimately pessimistic, this story is so important, as it holds the reader accountable, causing them to be more introspective, opening up their eyes to things they have chosen to ignore.

This novella gazes unflinchingly at how humanity faces and more often chooses not to face, the bitter realities of the environmental decline of the world around us. This novella implies that deep down people only care about things that are personal to them, and are ultimately unfazed by things that do not directly impact their way of life or their preferences. “Monstrous self interest masquerading as emotional stability”, as it is put in the story. Mirrors are a huge symbol in the story, and questions whether or not we are really honest with ourselves when we self-reflect, or if our own perceptions of ourselves are self-created with the intent of idealizing.

This novella tells the truth without regard for sensitivity, which I found refreshing. The story is a chameleon of sorts, shifting between science fiction and fable, but all the while maintains a dark and gritty tone that shows hopelessness and beauty entwined. I didn’t feel attached to any of the characters in a meaningful way, but I think that is partly because they were pretty detached and selfish people. It was purposeful, which I can also appreciate.

I think this novella fully accomplished it’s purpose, and while I would not say I loved the experience of reading it, I did benefit from it and I do recommend it.

Thank you Netgalley, Octavia Cade, and Stelliform Press for an early copy of this novella.



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Tw// suicide, self harm, depression

This was a very unique read. I’d never read something like this before and I appreciate the themes explored in this a lot, but at the same time the book simply wasn’t for me.

I’ll start with the good. The author has clearly done the required research and it shows in the writing. One of the most notable aspect was the handling of the Grief, the literary input regarding that, suicide, loneliness, depression, was put together really well and the focus on the environment and ecology truly was phenomenal in this book. Its just a very quotable book!

That said, the story felt like a meandering mess. There was no plot to it. I was waiting for something more to happen when it ended and nothing happened. While it lacked in plot, it also lacked in characters, there was no depth to the mc and i did not feel connected to her story or invested in any of the characters. The writing itself was accessible but not phenomenal or captivating.

Despite these, i think those were never a focus of the story. It dealt with a futuristic scenario and the theme was about loss and grief we feel from the extinction of other species and that was brought about and discussed, in a literary sense, phenomenally within the book. The author tackled and accomplished what the author had wanted really well!! So I definitely would recommend this book for people who enjoy speculative science books!!

Thank you to Stelliform Press for granting me with an arc in exchange for an honest review via NetGalley!

Thank you to NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book.

This book deals with climate change and the extinction of species and the ecosystem. It’s a book that really takes a tough topic and asks important questions that really makes you as a reader THINK about the world around you.

My only complaint is that I wish this book was longer and that I had more time to spend in this world and with these characters. I would love to know more about the creations and specifically the Sea Witch.

The writing of this book is beautiful. I truly look forward to reading more from this author.

I loved the beginning of this book. Beautifully written, elegant.
The ending felt so abrupt and I wasn't a fan of how it felt rushed.

This story started out wonderfully. The author has clearly done her research, and the science felt far more mature and considered than a lot of what I've been finding in literary fiction of late. I could clearly see the scenes; the lake of golden jellyfish, the abandoned pool, the wilds of Tasmania.

Unfortunately, despite a growing sense of mystery and unease, the story did not deliver. I know it's unfashionable to deliver a clear-cut ending, but there's a difference between giving your reader something, and giving them nothing. In the case of this novella, I was taken aback that the next page took me to the Acknowledgements. There wasn't any sense of an ending or a conclusion; the narrator's introspection was still unformed, too vague. Neither did her actions feel at all believable (would you just do nothing about the fact that you'd met a thylacine?). It was as if the novella couldn't decide if it wanted to paint future possibilities (the Grief) or be an exercise in pure surrealism.

(With thanks to Stelliform Press and NetGalley for this ebook in exchange for an honest review)

A novella that explores a future where humans have basically destroyed the planet, leading to flooding and loss of wildlife, even down to extinction of species. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this, but once I started reading, I found myself sucked into this piece of speculative fiction, avoiding sleep until the last page.

We follow Ruby, an environmentalist and jellyfish expert, whose friend Marjorie (the Sea Witch) recently committed suicide. In this future people become ill with Grief, a profound sense of loss and impending doom due to the loss of environment that ends with suicide. Grief is a staple of this story, an illness that can also cause madness, and it will have you questioning who is reliable, who is sane, and who isn’t. Ruby follows a stack of letters left by the Sea Witch, which takes her on a journey of morality and ethics. In order to combat this environmental loss, scientists are trying to directly resurrect lost species, but failing. Can we resurrect something that has already been lost? Will it ever be the same? Will it simply cause more problems? These are some of the questions we come upon with Ruby, who believes what is dead should stay dead, but the Sea Witch’s opinions and perspective always lingers over her head.

While this story is very obviously about environmentalism, there is also a focus on the effects of Grief on Indigenous populations in New Zealand, the effects of colonialism, greed, questionable science, and how we let things, and others, die. This story will stick with me. The writing was fantastic, and the author explored these topics really well while using a unique story to do so. I will be checking out this author’s other works, and I hope you do too.

Thank you to NetGalley and Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America for the ARC!

This short novella follows Ruby, a scientist, living in a time of Grief – when some are overwhelmed with a sense of loss and guilt for climate change and extinctions that ends in suicide. Ruby is always navigating her own susceptibility to it, and when her former colleague Marjorie is lost to Grief and leaves behind a mysterious stack of letters she begins to follow clues that lead her to several apparently ‘resurrected’ extinct species. However, these resurrections are anything but straightforward, and each one prompts questions about the possibility (or not) of undoing devastation.
Cade’s writing is beautiful – the characters felt multi-faceted and real. I did find the ending to be very abrupt, though I can understand this as a deliberate choice given the content of the text. My criticism here would be that the plot at times feels more like a vehicle for asking environmental + ethical questions than it does a story that really stands on its own – it doesn’t read as particularly subtle to me. However, do I appreciate the ways that Cade has found to ask a lot of important questions – about responsibility, accountability, the (in)ability to feel deep connection to (an)other specie(s) and to grieve them when they’re gone. I also appreciate that Cade has made clear connections between climate change, species extinction, and colonialism + genocide (I will note here that as a reader, I am not located in Australia or NZ and am not as knowledgeable about these histories as I could be – readers with more understanding of colonialism in this region specifically may have more to say here). I would, based on this novella, absolutely read more of Octavia Cade’s work.
Content warning: suicide, genocide, colonialism