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Notes from an Apocalypse
- Narrated by: Mark O'Connell
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
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Notes from an Apocalypse
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Summary
By the author of the award-winning To Be a Machine, a deeply felt book about our anxious present tense - and coming to grips with the future.
We're alive in a time of worst-case scenarios: The weather has gone uncanny. Our old postwar alliances are crumbling. Everywhere you look there's an omen, a joke whose punchline is the end of the world. How do we live in the shadow of such a grim future? What does the world hold for our children? What might it be like to live through the worst? And what is anybody doing about it?
Dublin-based writer Mark O'Connell is possessed by these questions. In Notes from an Apocalypse, he crosses the globe in pursuit of answers. He tours survival bunkers in South Dakota. He ventures to New Zealand, a favoured retreat of billionaires banking on civilisation's collapse. And he bears witness to those places the future has already visited - real-life portraits of the end of the world as we know it. In doing so, he offers a unique window into our apocalyptic imagination.
Part tour, part pilgrimage, Notes from an Apocalypse is an affecting and hopeful meditation on our alarming present moment. With insight, humanity and wit, O'Connell leaves you to wonder: What if the end of the world isn't the end of the world?
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What listeners say about Notes from an Apocalypse
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Martin Talks
- 01-07-20
I am the apocalypse of which I speak
Having read and really enjoyed To Be a Machine, I knew I would enjoy Notes from an Apocalypse and I was not disappointed. I very much enjoy O'Connell's clever use of language and acerbic, laconic and often poetic turn of phrase. O'Connell narrated it himself which I think enhanced his personal exploration of how people are dealing with the apocalypse and ultimately how he himself is facing the future and his role in shaping it.
'I am the apocalypse of which I speak' is a a great acknowledgement that we are all playing a role in the huge issues facing our planet and species.
Constant news of an impending apocalypse can be overwhelming and deafen us all: 'It's all horsemen, all of the time'. O'Connell himself asks 'Is it possible to be terrified and bored at the same time?' But by taking the approach of looking at the bizarre, warped and weird ways that humans are responding to fear of the apocalypse is a great way to remind us of our individual and communal responsibility for what might happen.
I was thankful for the note of optimism at the end, but the book leaves an overall feeling that if humans are in charge of our own destiny, the odds are against us and future generations.
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2 people found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- C. Carey
- 01-06-24
An Optimistic Trip to the Apocalypse
The narration and beauty of phrase blend for a wonderful, thought provoking book. There's some dark humour to pepper the mood too.
Very enjoyable, human and ultimately optimismic look at human nature in the face of our folly and (potential) demise.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Daft Monk
- 01-10-20
A talented writer in an intellectual prison
Mark writes evocatively about his family and with refreshing honesty about his own cynical failings
But in the stuff about the apocalypse he doesn't challenge himself in the same way and it winds up being an inconsequential travelogue, overlaid with a lot of political clichés.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 27-05-22
Beautiful, insightful, funny
This book is beautiful, insightful, and funny in all the ways you would expect from this marvelous author. It's also a stealth parenting manual.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Barry smullen
- 17-02-21
Fascinating grim fun
Mark did a wonderful job narrating this book.
The prepper section was fascinating. The section on Chernobyl was great, it got grimmer and grimmer with every sentence.
As the parent of young kids, I empathised with the duality of teaching your kids and protecting them (the Lorax).
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- ls822
- 24-11-20
👌👌👌
didn't think to be a machine could be topped but this is phenomenal. above and beyond
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1 person found this helpful