What will the climate crisis and the world’s response to it look like over the course of the next decade or two?

The Deluge by Stephen Markley offers one of the most thorough and compelling answers to this question that I’ve read to date. This novel explores almost every facet of the climate crisis in amazing and terrifying detail. Even after reading dozens of other climate fiction classics like Ministry for the Future, Termination Shock, and Parable of the Sower, I found myself blown away by both the sheer scope of this novel and the many skillful ways Markley drew me in and kept me reading throughout the entire 896-page journey.

This novel covers so much ground that it could easily be the subject of an entire semester-long course on climate fiction. Since this isn’t a climate fiction course, I’ll narrow the focus of this review to three themes: climate catastrophes, climate solutions, and narrative structure.