From the Bookshelf of Apocalypse Whenever…

Ariel

Steven R. Boyett

Start date: June 23, 2015

Finish date: July 1, 2015

Discussion: AW BOOK CLUB (spoilers)

Discussion leader: Gertie

Why we're reading this: Inexplicable Maguffin of modern technology just stopping one day is what makes this a post-apocalyptic st…more
[close] Inexplicable Maguffin of modern technology just stopping one day is what makes this a post-apocalyptic story. The young protagonist deals with the end of civilization as he knew it, and meets mythological creatures, and goes on a quest to the ruins of New York.

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AW BOOK CLUB (spoilers)

* What is a good book for AW discussion? (Nominations pool)
By Gertie · 65 posts · 218 views

last updated Oct 18, 2025 05:31PM

* AW Book Club: what we've read
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last updated Dec 10, 2019 09:01AM

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What Members Thought

Sep 14, 2011 Mitchell Friedman rated it really liked it

Shelves: urban-fantasy, bc-powellssfgroup, liked-reviews, fantasy, fiction, four-star, author-b

Ariel has been a favorite book for a long time - 20+ years - and in fact I read the slightly modified new edition of this book within the last two years and enjoyed it quite bit. So I was disappointed at this reread. Perhaps it is that reading a book for a book group makes me notice different things - it seems unlikely that I'm that different a person than I was two years ago. Or maybe I didn't really like it as much as I thought I did.

The writing could have been better. But I think it just seem ...more

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Jan 29, 2013 Dennis rated it liked it · review of another edition

More like 3 and a half stars... when cracking open a book where a unicorn plays a major role I really didn’t know what to think - I am not sure I remember reading much about unicorns, ever (a bit of an oversight on my part, I’m sure). But then again, when opening up this book, I think I did sort of know what I expected, and there this book succeeds. Seriously, a post-apocalyptic unicorn road trip novel - who even reads such things? Well, now, at least, I can say I have! It was an entertaining li ...more

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Oct 18, 2011 Krazykiwi rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

So, this 5* rating from 2011 is me doing a "comfort food" reread, one of several books chosen precisely because they were re-reads of things I adored as a teenager. Books where it didn't matter if I dozed off, or the drugs I was on made the books make no sense. For that purpose, it was beyond 5 stars.

It's also one of a handful of books I literally read to pieces as a teenager, and hardly anyone else I knew had read it at all. Like Vonda McIntyre's Dreamsnake, and Mary Gentle's Golden Witchbreed So, this 5* rating from 2011 is me doing a "comfort food" reread, one of several books chosen precisely because they were re-reads of things I adored as a teenager. Books where it didn't matter if I dozed off, or the drugs I was on made the books make no sense. For that purpose, it was beyond 5 stars.

It's also one of a handful of books I literally read to pieces as a teenager, and hardly anyone else I knew had read it at all. Like Vonda McIntyre's Dreamsnake, and Mary Gentle's Golden Witchbreed, which I also read until the paperbacks fell apart around the same era, I find I am rating them as much from nostalgia, and the things they gave me as a kooky teenager, escapism and ideas both.

To be fair, there are flaws with this book. The pacing for a good deal of it is glacial, right up until the part where it suddenly starts racing along and you have to re-read sections to figure out what the heck just went on. The writing wavers between exposition overload to "wait, what?" levels of brevity. At least one of the main protagonists is so annoying I want to punch her in the mouth pretty often, and the main character is so naive I never really got his appeal as a figure of romantic interest for all the female characters in the story. Mostly though, the ending is... unsatisfying, in a lot of ways. This is not HEA land, and my teenage self cried over it. Now as an adult, I appreciate it a bit better, but still think it's all kind of unfair.

It's also got some objectively good points. The subject was fresh and interesting at the time, although it's been copied plenty of times since, never in quite the same way. Boyett's ear for dialogue, particularly Ariel's is delightful in a lot of places.

So I'm about to launch into another re-read, July 2015, for a book club, and I suspect that, not deathly ill and drugged to the eyeballs, and 30 years after my very very intense love affair with this book and with Ariel, that if this were a first read, I very likely couldn't give it 5 stars.

I don't care though, enough to change my rating. I loved it then, and that's enough. ...more

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Jul 19, 2008 Erica rated it really liked it

Shelves: childhood, sffantasy

I remember loving this book as a teenager. I'm fairly sure it subtly influenced my view of the world we live in and destroy daily.
I was happy to read on www.steveboy.com that he's working on a sort-of sequel called Eloi. I hope he finds a publisher for it!
...more

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