Epitaph Road by David Patneaude

I have read many, many dystopian/utopian novels. I am always fascinated by what different authors come up with as a way to solve our world's issues. How do we make our world a better place? In this particular novel, one drastic change is to eliminate the male population. (Well, the majority of the male population. Some males are still needed to procreate the next generation of females, after all!)

Kellen is a 14 year old boy. His parents received authorization to have a child, although his father "was surgically implanted with a hormone-excreting gadget to drastically reduce the changes of him producing a male infant". Those efforts failed, and Kellen was born. (This novel is set in 2097 - with the first wave of Elisha's Bear - the plague that nearly wiped out the male population - occurring 30 years earlier in 2067. So using medical gadgets to allow only female babies doesn't seem that far-fetched to me. Some people already choose the gender of their children today.)

With the near elimination of men, the world becomes a safer, better world. Crimes against women and children are reduced dramatically. Wars come to a halt and are not re-instigated. Illegal drug use, prostitution and pornography are eliminated. Prisons are emptied. The money spent on all of the above are reallocated to health care, the environment, medical research, etc. Sounds pretty wonderful, right?

All is not what it seems. First of all, women have all the control and all of the power. The surviving men are forced to live under that control, be sterilized, work only in a handful of jobs that do not involve positions of authority, or live as an outcast. Kellen's dad, Charlie, chooses the latter. When Kellen is 5 years old, Charlie leaves to live in a community of men - or really near a community of men, since he chooses to be a "loner" living on his boat in a marina. Charlie lost his own father in the original wave of Elisha's Bear, so he knew what it was like before the plague. Charlie was only one person in a growing number of people - both men and women - who rejected the new world.

What I love about these books is the reminder that there is no such thing as a "perfect world" - that elusive utopian society that some strive for. As long as there is a person, or group of people, in power, there will never be true happiness and security for all. There is a "twist" in this story towards the end, which cements that even more fully. The end of this book isn't really an ending. It's more of a beginning of a new chapter of a new world.

Wendy's Rating: ****