Justin's Notes
Jan. 11, 2026
This story follows a man named Higs and some of his story of surviving a pandemic that wiped out the world, including all of his friends and family. With his dog Jasper, he has stayed afloat living out of an abandoned airport. Eventually, he hears a radio transmission while on a flight in his '56 Cessna and realizes he can't stay at this airport forever. Higs is driven to see if there is hope on the other end of that transmission and leaves the comfort he has come to know.
I really enjoyed this story. Peter Heller is a master at pace and making his writing engaging. There is no reading exhaustion for me when I am reading his books. The story flows as a stream of consciousness from Higs, a running inner dialogue, with breaks of conversation. It can take a few pages to get used to the mix of broken sentences and the lack of punctuation (similar to Cormac McCarthy), but it really does read like a brain thinks. I know my inner thoughts aren't always fully formed and comprehensible, so why would an apocalypse survivor's be?
The story itself is also great. I love the scenes Heller writes. Hiking through the mountains, flying in the Cessna over rundown abandoned towns. I think in every book Heller writes, someone fishes at some point. Maybe a way to give a moment of calmness or peace. It was nice to have a post-apocalyptic story that wasn't only sadness on sadness. There are moments of humor, of happiness, of redemption. He blends the emotional and mental tug-of-war between hope and hopelessness into just about every scenario Higs finds himself in, making the point that it is indeed worth it to lean into any hope we find when all feels hopeless.
If you enjoy post-apocalyptic or survival stories, I would highly recommend this story. The easiest comparison for me is The Road by Cormac McCarthy (one of my favorite books of all time). I can promise you this one is less heavy and depressing, so if you want to give the genre a try, this is a solid place to start.
