“Severance” by Ling Ma

“Severance,” by Ling Ma, isn’t the type of book you want to read during a pandemic – it’s a dystopian, end-of-the-world novel – so if you are sensitive to that, don’t pick this up. But I was going through it so quickly, I couldn’t stop. I gulped this book down in a day, not because it was amazing; it was more like hurrying through breakfast so I could get on with my day.

“Severance” tells the story of Candace Chen, a quirky millennial who seems more comfortable inside her own head than out in the world. Her parents, immigrants from China, have both died so she is truly alone. She falls into jobs, relationships and apartments haphazardly. By her own account, she’s living a somewhat bland and blasé life, going to the bars and buying expensive items more by rote than by desire – none of it seems enjoyable or fun. Then, all of a sudden, the Shen Fever hits and the world dies. Well, people don’t exactly die from the fever. They become “fevered;” they are caught up in a loop of memories that they perform over and over. They are like robots – there are no thoughts or consciousness behind what they are doing. They just do things like set the table, fold clothes, drive taxi routes over and over and over. They don’t eat or drink or sleep so eventually, they die from lack of sustenance. It’s like the way Candace lives her life but she does it deliberately - not because of a disease – and she eats, drinks and sleeps. But otherwise, she lives a habit-filled life. So much so that she continues to go into work while the world is dying around her.

Once she figures out she should leave New York, she falls in with a group of survivors headed by the narcissistic Bob. They are headed for “The Facility” in Chicago where the idea is to create a new society. The group has been together for a while before Candace joins. She goes along with them because there really isn’t anything else to do. She is carrying (literally) a secret that, once discovered, puts her in jeopardy.

The story jumps around between Candace’s New York City life before and during Shen Fever, her time with Bob and the group, and then memories of her parents. The descriptions of New York City, especially when Candace goes back to her photography, are great. “New York is possibly the only place in which most people have already lived, in some sense, in the public imagination, before they ever arrive” rings so true to me! Candace seemed most alive when describing the city – it almost has more vivacity than her. But it was her parents and their story that I found the most interesting. Their journey from China to Utah, the reasons for the journey, the things they left behind, the things they do in America…I found these sections the most appealing probably because they seemed the most alive. Candace just seems to be going through the motions of life because she has to. Her parents lived life. 

The jumping around in time and place is done well – it isn’t jarring and you always know where you are within the story. And the story isn’t ALL about the end of the world. It’s more about Candace who has to live through the end of the world. I am not sure if there is a lesson to be gleaned from Candace’s journey, other than there comes a time when you have to create some kind of inertia in life. There’s also a little “why them” thing hanging in the air when two of the survivor group come down with Shen Fever. These two returned home, so to speak, and bam! They get the fever. Not sure if Ma is trying to make a statement that going back isn’t a way to move forward or dwelling on the past will just make you sick, but it could be gleaned that way.

All in all, “Severance” wasn’t horrible – the writing is nuanced and the imagery fresh. Granted, the cause of the end of the world was a bit jarring in a Covid world (and the pandemic bits are eerily prescient for a book published in 2018), but my main beef was with Candace. All the events of the world are filtered through her and she was apathetic to the point of annoyance. Her blasé, “angsty millennial” attitude had me rolling my eyes more than once. I mean, I guess I get that you would continue to go into work (and only you) while the world was dying around you out of habit? But to just notice one day that there was no one walking around New York City… well that seemed a stretch to me. It’s New York City, one of the most crowded places in the world. The absence of people, gradual or not, would be noticed by a flea. Along with closed up stores, darkened windows and declining infrastructure. So yeah, Candace kinda drove me crazy. I will also fully admit that I may not be the best judge of a book that is clearly intended for a younger audience. The book jacket describes “Severance” as a “moving family story, a quirky coming-of-adulthood tale, and a hilarious, deadpan satire for which the end of the world gets put in its rightful place.” I gotta say, I didn’t get any of that. But then again, my coming-of-adulthood didn’t involve the end of the world so maybe Candace had the right attitude after all.