The Unmapping is an interesting look at the experience of living in New York City after a disaster. The new adult main characters navigate (literally) a changed world and their places in it. Accessible writin and hopeful undertones- I will be looking for more from this debut author..

I really enjoyed this strange, curious story. Thank you Net Galley and Bindery Books for the advanced reader copy!

I have so many mixed feelings about this book. I really did enjoy the parts where we got to explore more of the plot in regards to the unmapping, and also really enjoyed the authors writing style, but had some major issues, especially with the characters.
I am someone whose favorite part of a book is usually the characters, so having the characters be generally unlikeable (to me, at least) made it very difficult to get into this book. I did appreciate that the two main characters were written in a unique and even realistic way that spoke to different issues we often see in the world. We had someone who seemed to care more about social media and the performative aspect and idea of being seen as a hero than he did about actually making a difference and another person whose whole identity was wrapped up in her job and her relationship to the point where she had completely lost any sense of who she was as an individual and was unable to cope when these things were removed from her life. But while I found those characterizations interesting, I really disliked the characters themselves, and reading from their point of view and being inside of their heads was not an enjoyable experience, especially during the first half of the book.
About halfway through, we started to delve into the unmapping a little more, which I really enjoyed. The ways all the different characters and storylines were weaving together were really interesting, and I really liked all of the other smaller side plots that were being brought in. It all made me more invested in the story, and I got through the second half pretty quickly, wanting to see how everything would come together. Unfortunately, I didn't find the ending particularly satisfying either. I wasn't a fan of how the characters ended their stories, and the story regarding the unmapping also felt a little unfinished, possibly because it felt like so much more of the book was dedicated to the characters.
Overall, I felt like having the focus of the book be on the characters rather than this really unique and interesting idea weakened the story a lot, but I'd still be interested to read more from this author in the future as I did really enjoy her writing.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was so intrigued by the concept and cover here, but just could not find my way into the story... I struggle with dystopian novels, especially lately given the state of the world, and this is largely what I think I struggled with here. It's a tough story - dark and heavy - and there are a lot of characters and I had a tough time connecting to the individual components as well as the story as a whole. This one wasn't a good fit for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and Bindery Books for giving me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
~

The Unmapping is story in which women rely entirely on men for their sense of self, nobody learns anything, and there are no consequences. Yes, it is as frustrating as it sounds. Spoilers follow.

The strength of this book is mostly in the central event of the Unmapping itself. There are an infinite number of interesting stories to be told, particularly from the NYC Emergency Management Department, struggling to deal with the crisis as it first unfolds. We do get to see some of those stories, and that is where the book is at its best, in the early days.

It was the characters that bothered me the most, though, especially the weirdly sexist depiction of women. Esme, an Emergency Management team leader, is shown to be a capable and intelligent person in her own right, with a strong sense of responsibility to the city—so why does that all get sidelined in place of her having an emotional breakdown over her fiancé going missing, realizing that she basically can’t function without him and never has? It undercuts her character so fundamentally. She only really starts to come alive again when she starts dating Arjun, another protagonist and Emergency Department worker, who she has been unkind to the entire book until that point very close to the end. Whether intentionally or not, she is portrayed as needing a man to keep her stable, which just felt gross.

Rosemary, another female character, literally waits for her husband to get home every day to tell her what to do and devoted her life entirely to his interests, but the narrative doesn’t explore her getting a newfound sense of freedom when he disappears. No, instead she’s pretty immediately seduced by a cult and becomes indoctrinated, before conveniently getting free and immediately going back to her husband, who helps her start to get better. The narrative fails to actually challenge her status in any way, actually making it seem like she needs a man to survive, like Esme.

And Arjun is an incompetent fool with a crush on an engaged woman, careless and driven entirely by emotion, but always magically succeeds despite being pretty objectively creepy.

I did not like these people, Esme was at least interesting to read but no character truly changes or faces consequences here. There are no stakes, and no one learns anything. The mayor of New York City magically disappears near the end of the book and is revealed to be hiding out in New Jersey, dating a married man with no repercussions. It’s just so difficult to care.

And then there’s the hamfisted environmental component of the story. We never get a definitive answer on what causes the Unmapping, but the widely accepted explanation in-universe is that it has some vague ties to climate change and pollution. This just annoyed me. Climate change is brought up but nothing is actually said about it. It feels like the author wanted to try and get an environmental message in without actually committing to one. I’m not bothered by not knowing fully what caused the Unmapping, but I am bothered by a lazy message like “pollution is bad.”

There were other issues, like jarring tone shifts—this book couldn’t decide if it wanted to be lighthearted or serious, grounded or fantastical—and not committing to wrapping up certain stories, but my largest issues really were the characters.

I was very disappointed by this one.

2/5 aluminum Christmas trees.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bindery to be able to read this early!!

I have never enjoyed a book where I disliked almost the entire cast of characters until this one. The concept of becoming unmapped and untethered to what is important to you is really unsettling. I honestly don’t know how I’d react to it.

What ended up not working for me was how much telling versus showing we got. Don’t get me wrong!! I did enjoy the chatty feel of the narration and with the swapping of perspectives, it seemed necessary. But I really enjoyed when we switched to the side characters because it was through moments they had with the main characters where the reflection worked.

Anyway! I don’t think this book will be for everyone. And that’s okay! I’d honestly love more sci fi concepts written by the author because while this wasn’t a perfect book for me, I finished it during a single flight. It was engaging and kept my attention.

Wow! This book absolutely blew me away. I knew from reading the description it was going to be different, and I don't want to give anything away, just know that you want to read this book!

The Unmapping was one of my most anticipated books for 2025, due to its very unique and intriguing premise (and not to mention, stunning cover). And I do think it delivered. The setting is New York, and one day the city wakes up to every single building having moved, and this continues to happen every day at 4 am. This becomes known as The Unmapping. Since the buildings themselves move but not their surrounding plot, many buildings are cut off from their gas and electricity lines. Many people go missing as well as they leave their houses in the morning as usual, only to not find their way back at the end of the day, and one boy is caught underground. What ensues is a very disorienting life as the city and its inhabitants try to figure out what's going on, how everyone is affected, and how to create a new normal.

We mainly follow Esme and Arjun. Esme is a woman who works at the Emergency Management Department and whose job is to try and manage some of this crisis. Her fiancé is a journalist who is the person to first expose that this very phenomenon has happened before in a small town. There is a sub-plot as well about this town and the strange things going on there (major cult vibes), beyond just the Unmapping. Once The Unmapping comes to New York, he is one of the people who go missing. Our other main character is my favourite — Arjun, a lonely, fedora wearing man who also works at the Emergency Management Department, but more on the ground. They are friends, and Arjun is in love with Esme without her knowledge.

The writing style is quite simple yet effective and distinctive in a way I can't quite put my finger on. It's very straightforward, and poses a lot of questions throughout in a bit of a stream of consciousness way. The pacing lies somewhere in the middle. Because it's so easy to read, it keeps drawing me forward and I keep wanting to pick it up to find out what's going to happen, yet sometimes not much actually happens. It's not a very plot driven book, despite this very intriguing event. It's more like studies of these characters all drawn together by this crazy event — how they are affected by it and respond to it. One interesting writing device Robbins uses is that she doesn't always give the side characters names, which to me feels like a way of showing that these are just one response, or one experience out of millions affected by this. I found myself wishing some side plots had more space to be explored, especially the one around the first town to be Unmapped, and the journalist living there, I found that story very interesting but it was left a little unfinished.

Overall a very solid debut novel, 4.25. I’ve never before heard of a similar premise, and it was a very interesting lightly sci-fi twist on more realistic climate fiction with some interesting societal analyses. I would be very keen to read more from this author in the future. Thank you so much to the publisher for providing me with the e-ARC!

An imaginative plot but the follow-through is very poor.

Esme & Arjun, the principal characters in the story, work in the emergency services in NY. Esme sees an explosion at a coffee shop and sets action in motion. Arjun is an emergency worker always looking to step in and help people. He stays in In NY with his dad. His parents are separated with his mom being in India. Both Esme & Arjun are taken aback when an ‘Unmapping’ occurs where entire blocks of the city shift around. This had first happened in a town in Wisconsin. The Empire State Building ends up in Coney Island, and the shift is not one-time. It looks like there will be parts which will shift into the sea. Other cities across the world are to follow. People are distraught, emergency services overwhelmed, radical gangs form, and the political governance is in disarray. Esme’s boyfriend Marcus is nowhere to be seen.

The concept is brilliant but is almost entirely let down by the writing. The character development is poor. Though the broad contours of Esme & Arjun’s characters are interesting, they are very flat characters. The relationships in the book go nowhere and is especially disappointing since the scenario provides an ideal backdrop for good character development & relationships. I found the narrative to be listless, though some of the incidents which follow are interesting.

Overall, a book which falls way short of potential.

My rating: 2.5 / 5.

The premise is good and I liked the read but it was a little chaotic for me. I did not follow the plot entirely. Robbins have a lot of potential though! Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to review a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

In "The Unmapping", Robbins introduces readers to a version of New York City where a looming threat has been approaching and finally hits and completely rearranges the entire physical structure of one of the most populous cities in the world. At the forefront of the story are Esme Green, an employee of the Emergency Management Department looped into the city's efforts to restore some semblance of order, and Arjun Varma, her coworker at the EMD tasked with groundwork to find and rescue civilians who've been impacted.

What follows in the next few days is a chaotic scramble; Esme attempts to work with the bureaucratic system and hierarchy, butting heads with her (male) superiors while trying to get ahold of her fiance Marcus who has abruptly disappeared. Arjun attempts to help as best he can within the city, but causes chaos when his efforts are misinterpreted and blasted on social media - all while trying to keep his feelings for Esme hidden. Meanwhile, the many citizens of the city are dealing with their own issues: a young runaway has become trapped underground in the midst of the city's shifting infrastructure; a woman is robbed on her way to meet her new lover; a reverend offers shelter to a growing following of a religious group; a journalist seeks answers from Gleamwood City to the origins of the Unmapping... The different perspectives and storylines converge as the novel progresses to shed some light on the colossal event.

I was intrigued by the dystopian/sci-fi premise of this novel and its center in NYC where I currently live; knowing the exact cross streets and neighborhoods mentioned in this novel was a fun perk. Thematically, I think Robbins incorporated a number of themes and looming topics, including climate change and the impact of corporate greed; the bureaucracy of government across all levels; societal and racial privilege; and the fine line between religion and cults. Unfortunately it didn't feel like many of these had sufficient focus in this story and were cursory examinations at best. I struggled as well with the sheer number of characters and perspectives, and while I can understood Robbins' stylistic intention to introduce many of them as unnamed, I didn't think it served much purpose as these names were all eventually revealed. I didn't feel as though the two protagonists were well-developed either, and their evolving relationship was questionable at times.

Overall I thought the plot of "The Unmapping" was promising, but needed additional editing and clarity of characters and voice.

Phenomenally strange! Oh how I loved it. The concept of Unmapping itself had me instantly enthralled, the character shifts and general sense of oddness had me turning each page even faster knowing that I was never going to get enough answers for this to seem logical. Nor did I need to! I just got to have a great time in this wonderfully weird world that also had some solid points about politics, climate change, and of course, Christmas.

This book was given to me in exchange for a free review by NetGalley.

I was really interested by the theme of this literary, speculative novel and jumped in with a lot of curiosity.
What would a world where the environment keeps on shuffling around be like?

I had hoped to find something similar to some of the Japanese speculative novels that I've read, which also touched on strange environmental phenomena. But I just couldn't get into the writing style. It felt so wordy, with never-ending sentences.

I tried to read some of them out, as I told my husband how I was struggling with this read and wanted to illustrate that... and realised I was running out of breath almost every single sentence. This sharply explained why it felt off and was so hard to focus on.

The characterisation was pretty good, I liked some of the little mundane things about them, giving them humanity, but the style kept them distant.
I just wasn't engaged with any of it. But if you like contemporary literary books it might be up your alley.

Thanks to Netgalley and Bindery Books for providing this ARC. All opinions are my own.

Wow, what a great start to the reading year! This book is full of complex, compelling characters, and I was so invested in them. Esme, grappling with her fractured relationship with her fiance paired with her organized personality. Arjun's anxiousness, his compulsive desire to feel needed and do good, was resonant. By the end, it was sweet and powerful to see Arjun overcoming his anxiety, Esme reframing her life around herself — how far both of them came. At times I felt their pain, was exasperated by their choices, was buoyed by their hope. Always, I was captivated. In some ways it felt like watching a friend grow.

The flow-of-consciousness writing style I think is so different from anything I've ever read and I love the literary/speculative mix! Here, it’s striking and suits the anxious tension of the narrative. And this world — it felt chaotically true. I loved moments where, despite people bracing against things they couldn’t understand, they still found unity, connection, hope - a light in the midst of an ocean of uncertainty. This unity came through especially in the narration, and I loved the way all those disparate plotlines and perspectives wove together so fluidly into a really breathless ending. I shivered! I ached. This book left me feeling thoughtful, and awed, and warm — it felt like waiting for spring. It felt like stepping into a movie and leaving open-jawed. Just wow! 

“But this has been a year of miracles. Miracles as big as flying buildings and as small as the pinky finger that has learned how to stay still. As big and invisible as love. The miracle of existing. The miracle of moving.” — The Unmapping.

The premise of The Unmapping immediately drew me in: New York City’s buildings rearrange themselves every night, leaving the city in chaos with missing landmarks, a broken power grid, and mysterious cults emerging in the aftermath. The first 100 pages take their time setting up the world, but once the story gains momentum, it becomes really engaging.

There’s a diverse cast of characters whose lives become intertwined as they navigate the challenges of this ever-changing city. I enjoyed following their different journeys and seeing how they handled the constant upheaval. This book kept me thinking about how I would act if the world around me was always changing, and I’m really glad I picked it up.

Thank you to Netgalley and Bindery Books for the e-ARC!

The premise of this book immediately caught my attention. I've been fascinated by cli-fi stories for a while where authors examine how climate change and disasters impact humans and how people form community and come together in times of need. In particular, I found the POV of our two main characters to be really interesting. Esme and Arjun both work at New York's emergency management team and they are tasked with managing the distaster response for "The Unmapping".

I'd say this was more of a literary leaning sci-fi, where there was a focus on the individual characters. Personally, I loved this aspect of the book and also really enjoyed how the author showed us other POV characters (who were often unnamed) and illustrated how all these characters were interconnected and showcased the struggles they were encountering.

The writing for this book was sharp, witty, and definitely chatty. Sometimes I felt like I was reading the characters' stream of consciousness (especially Arjun's). I found this style of writing to be griping and helped me connect with the characters and root for them. Arjun in particular, was such a fascinating character to me, especially because I think there are many people who want to be "heroes" and want to feel needed in times of need.

There were some subplots that I couldn't really wrap my head around (re: the cult and the explanation for the Unmapping), but I think the character work in this book was splendid.

Super excited to see the author's upcoming works!

I found it quite difficult to finish this book. The 2 main characters really hooked me in at first but their character development throughout the book felt a bit off. While I’m sure there was a literary reason for it, the reason to only name some of the characters was lost on me and as a result left me not having much interest in them.

A shame as I was really looking forward to this one as I love a dystopian book BUT I can absolutely understand why some people loved this book so check it out for yourself!!

2.5 stars rounded up.

“The first rule of emergencies is you never know what will happen until it happens.”
Esme and Arjun work in different departments for Emergency Management in New York City, one being in the office and the other in the field. Their worlds become completely unglued when different buildings in the city are not where they should be…and it happens again and again, always at 4 in the morning. As they both race to assist the city in whatever way possible, can they hold themselves together?
I enjoyed the premise of this book, but its execution seemed a bit lacking. Robbins uses different people’s perspectives to outline how insane an emergency can be and how it affects one’s life; however, I did not comprehend why some of these recurring characters weren't given names. Don’t expect to have everything resolved at the end of the book. Give it a chance. It wasn’t my cup of tea, but it may be yours.

I was really excited to dive into this book because I found the blurb fascinating and boy it did not disappoint. Such an interesting take, Robbins take us in an incredible journey with a very unique story. I loved the setting, the characters and the writing. I can't wait to hear more about this author!.

Thanks to Bindery Books | Mareas and NetGalley for this ARC of Denise S. Robbins' 'The Unmapping.'

Fascinating concept. Not sure how successfully it's been conveyed in this sci-fi/speculative/dystopian novel. NYC wakes up one morning to find itself and its infrastructure moved around.

There's an awful lot of moving parts (no pun intended) and characters and I didn't find them completely successfully connected.

I'm not sure if the cause of the unmapping is ever properly revealed and the whole cult thing seemed unmoored and unfinished.

I think there's a fantastically original core to 'The Unmapping' - just wasn't carried through.

I did learn through that aluminium Christmas trees were actually once a real thing - Google tells me they fell out of fashion in the mid-60s but the retro-freaks have driven prices up in recent times for any remaining examples!