I Cheerfully Refuse

Enger’s latest is slightly futuristic and horribly plausible.

It explores the possible effects of global warming, pandemics, and a triumph of anti-literacy politics—creating desperate people, a billionaire class and a crumbling society. Yet the main character Rainy is a gentle bear of a man—a musician and handyman devoted to his wife Lark, a librarian turned bookseller in an anti-book world. But in an instant Rainy’s life is changed and he sets sail both in the hopes of finding Lark and on the run from trouble. This is set on and around Lake Superior—with a touch of Gulliver’s Travels, the Orpheus myth, and Station Eleven.