#Christina Sweeney-Baird

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[am-molloy]

Book Review: The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

You'd think a book about a Plague (pandemic) would be white noise in today's reality. But it's not and different enough from our current pandemic of Covid-19 that it works. As bad as Covid-19 is, I am glad that it is the pandemic we are living through and not the one in this book. Yes, Covid-19 is terrible (I should know, I had it, and it wasn't fun), and it has killed so many people, but somehow this Plague in The End Of Men spreads faster and is more deadly. Most of the people I know are female, so at least if this were to happen, I wouldn't lose them, but I'd hate to lose my dad and male friends and relatives.

This book was so heavily researched on various topics, such as medical terms, vaccine making, politics and economy (to name a few), that I feel as though I am reading a history book instead of fiction. Everything that happens sounds like it actually <i>could</i> happen, and it's insane. Seeing as 2025 isn't far from now, I wonder if the author saw the future and wrote about it as a virus prevention method. Yes, she started writing in 2018, but most of the book was written and then published during the current pandemic.

I loved reading this book from multiple perspectives from characters of different backgrounds worldwide. (And there is some LGBT+ representation, and we love that in a book). I initially thought I wouldn't like it and that I might have a hard time remembering which character did what, but it wasn't like that. It was easy to follow, and each character had such a distinct role in the story, so I always knew who was who.

This book is certainly not white noise. I think it is a necessary read that may even help with the current Covid-19 pandemic. Not to mention it's just a fantastic story that hits all the heartstrings. I can't recommend this book enough.

[bloodmaarked]

➫ monthly book round-up: may 2024

books read: 7 [+17%] average rating: 3.14 [-17%] average speed: 7 days [+6%] total pages: 2,728 [+23%] yearly goal progress: 29/50 [58%] best of the month: the end of men, christina sweeney-baird worst of the month: black girls must die exhausted, jayne allen

4.5* reads:

the end of men, christina sweeney-baird

4* reads:

this is my brain in love, i.w. gregorio

3.5* reads:

the memoirs of sherlock holmes, arthur conan doyle

she's in CTRL: how women can take back tech, anne-marie imafidon

3* reads:

sorrowland, rivers solomon

2* reads:

and so i roar, abi daré

1.5* reads:

black girls must die exhausted, jayne allen

currently reading:

quiet: the power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking, susan cain

babel, or the necessity of violence: an arcane history of the oxford translators' revolution, r.f. kuang

[catsbooksandbees]

Book Two of 2022!

⭐️⭐️

The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

The year is 2025 and a mysterious virus has broken out in Scotland, a lethal illness that seemingly only affects men. The virus becomes both a global pandemic and a political one. We see the uncountable ways the absence of men has changed society.

Content Warnings: death, grief, medical content, domestic violence and abuse, infertility, suicide, war

What Did I Think?

Firstly, this was written right before the pandemic happened, but I read it during the pandemic, and that made the experience of this that bit more interesting! Especially since our pandemic is also a global and a political one.

I originally gave this book three out of five stars but, as time has passed, I just find that I don’t have many happy memories of my reading experience. I thought the science was under researched and not well fleshed out, there were so many plot holes, and although I think focusing on the domestic like husbands and children was an important part of the story, it ended up being a majority of the story.

Saying that, I enjoyed the writing style and would absolutely consider reading something again by this author, as this was her first novel and she can only get better from here! The book was engaging, fast paced and action packed. It was a really fun read but it just had too many issues with it that I struggled to overlook.

Prompts:

This fit into my 52 Books Challenge prompt, “Set on at Least Two Continents”

It also fit into a Popsugar prompt, “A Book About or Set in a Non-patriarchal Society”

[foreverchangingfandomsao3]

Get to know me

I was tagged by the lovely @ferretrade so thank you and I hope your move goes well!!!

Last song:

Epiphany from Sweeney Todd, which is brilliant but does mean I've spent the last few days muttering they all deserve to die under my breath...

Currently watching:

House MD but that's a rewatch because I love Hugh Laurie that much and he's brilliant at portraying chronic pain!

Currently reading:

The end of men by Christina Sweeney-Baird which is incredible and about a disease that only targets men and how life changes because of it. It's a really good read and I'd highly recommend it!

Current obsession:

Sweeney Todd, specifically the current Broadway version but also Frost reignited my Tholme obsession so there's that too!

I'm tagging (absolutely no pressure): @tired-bshocked @mcu-supersoldiers @frostbitebakery @sunflowersinheaven @journen @im-here-and-im-confused @crc-jedi-knight-serushna @charrhylis and @afoundling

[lavenderselkie]

Goodreads needs a block button for authors so I can stop seeing the same repulsive male spewing his idiot reviews as the top review of a bunch of different feminist sci-fi books. Literally I'm about to start buying books on the basis that this woman-hating freak complained about them.

Anyway I've just started The Men by Sandra Newman and I hope it will be better than Christina Sweeney-Baird's The End of Men in showing more of how women handle crises and build women-only society.

[isabelle201180]

La fin des hommes de Christina Sweeney-Baird

https://aude-bouquine.com/2023/05/04/la-fin-des-hommes-christina-sweeney-baird-totem-paru-le-4-mai-2023/

[thecreatureoftheshadows]

“We can never regain what we have lost and we must accept that, mourn that, grieve what cannot be, and find a new way to exist. ”

~ End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

[alexsfictionaddiction]

Review: The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

A deadly virus that only affects and kills men? Women finally being given the chance to save the world? Speculative fiction tends to be very hit and miss for me but the concept of this one spoke to me and I’m so glad I got the chance to read it.

It’s 2025 and a mysterious virus only affecting men has broken out in a Glasgow hospital. Dr Amanda MacLean is the whistleblower but her higher-ups dismiss her claims as hysterical ravings. This leads to the virus evolving into a global pandemic that is killing men of all ages and backgrounds at an alarming rate. It’s down to women to keep the world running and find a vaccine while dealing with intense fear and grief for their husbands, sons, fathers and brothers.

The End of Men is told through the perspectives of women all over the world. Of course, one of these is Amanda who treated Patient Zero and discovered the nature and severity of the virus. Her bosses and the government believe that she is simply blowing things out of proportion and so delay doing anything that could stop the spread beyond Glasgow. It’s highly believable that had Amanda been male, she would have been taken a lot more seriously and the pandemic could have been avoided. The catastrophic consequences of institutional misogyny are touched on several times in the novel and naturally, the uncontrollable spiraling of the virus is strong evidence that women need to be listened to and believed.

There are a lot of parallels to real life, especially real life in the midst of a pandemic. Namely the conspiracy theorists. Of course, in the case of the Male Plague, all of the conspiracists are men, adamant that the virus was created by militant feminists to eliminate them. I couldn’t help but laugh and shake my head while reading this fantastically dramatic but realistic blog post. These men definitely exist!

Catherine is an anthropologist, whose life has been dogged with fertility issues. She has a wonderful marriage to Anthony and they have a lovely little boy called Theodore. Naturally, when the virus explodes, Catherine’s life revolves around shielding both of them from it. Her thread is truly heartbreaking and leads her to want to document the human stories from the pandemic, interviewing the widow of Patient Zero and trying to find some kind of positive outcome from it. I cried several times during Catherine’s story, so beware of that! 

We also hear from Elizabeth, an American virologist who travels to London to help with the vaccine and amazingly finds love. The increased racism is another parallel to our recent reality. Of course, nothing is the fault of white people. These reflections give the book a degree of credibility. Yes, it’s fiction but it often felt like I was reading snippets of COVID-19 memoirs.

When international travel and trade stops, the UK is forced to adapt. For example, there is a tea shortage which to a Brit seems horrific. Dawn is one of the only Black women working in British Intelligence. She has a fantastic sense of humour and her thread gives us a lot of information about the political upheaval caused by the Plague. The book is set in 2025 (only four years away) and yet Scotland is independent and China has been broken into individual states, following the fall of the Communists. These fascinating insights into a world that isn’t too far away almost act as a warning that humans need to be kinder -to each other, to ourselves and to the planet.

Other characters include; Helen, a mother of daughters whose husband leaves her in search of a ‘better life’ in what he thinks are his final days, Rosamie, a Filipina nanny working in Singapore for a wealthy family who are blighted by Plague tragedy and Toby, a man in his 60s, stranded on a boat off the coast of Iceland, desperately writing letters to his wife in the UK. There is also Maria Ferreira, a Latina journalist, Lisa, a Canadian Virology professor whose team develops the first effective vaccine and Morven, a Scottish hostel owner, who is forced to take in a group of orphaned boys with nowhere else to go. So, there are a LOT of characters to keep up with, which can get confusing at times because not of all of them have particularly distinctive voices. They do each provide an individual view on the devastation but I’m not sure we needed all of them!

Of course with 90% of men gone, women have had to adapt in a plethora of ways. Female sexuality is openly much more fluid with women dating women having risen significantly. There is also a chapter from a transgender nurse who talks about the effects of a virus that only kills biologically male bodies. I would have loved to have had this expanded on because I think it could have been a very thought-provoking discussion on gender and what that really means. 

There are some benefits from the Plague and of course, it’s women that are enjoying them. Better health care, better fitting clothes, more stock put into their words and emotions. This illustrates how much better the world could be for women when their issues are forced to be society’s focus. 

The End of Men is a unique dystopian that reads like a warning of a world that isn’t very far away. The writing is very sharp and factual, so if you love beautifully written books, this may not be for you. There is a lot of heart in it though and ultimately, it deals with a world forever changed but with a permanent trail of grief and heartache in its wake. An incredibly timely novel.

The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird will be published by Borough Press, an imprint of HarperCollins, on 29th April 2021.

[rathertoofondofbooks]

Mini Book Reviews: The End of Men | Madam | The Final Chapter | All Boys Aren't Blue

Mini Book Reviews: The End of Men | Madam | The Final Chapter | All Boys Aren’t Blue

It’s time for another selection of mini reviews of books that I’ve read recently. These four books are from NetGalley and I enjoyed them all. The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird The End of Men opens with an A&E doctor realising that a virus is spreading through her department and she attempts to warn authorities. The novel then moves forward a day or two and then a few days at a time…

[cherylmmbookblog]

#BlogTour The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

#BlogTour The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

It’s my turn on the BlogTour for this exciting new dystopian story – The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird. About the Author About the author: Christina was born in 1993 and grew up between London and Glasgow. She studied Law at the University of Cambridge and graduated with a First in 2015. Christina works as a Corporate Litigation lawyer in London. The End of Men is her first…

[favfragment]

Wiesz, świat nie musi o tobie pamiętać, by twoje życie miało jakiś sens.

Koniec mężczyzn, Christina Sweeney-Baird 

[bloodmaarked]

➸ reading list

just added:

prophet, helen macdonald + sin blanché

our share of night, mariana enriquez

the sun and the void, gabriela romero-lacruz

a greek love: a novel of cuba, zoé valdés

the thursday murder club, richard osman

black england: a forgotten georgian history, gretchen gerzina

black people in the british empire, peter fryer

the end of men, christina sweeney-baird

the actor, chris macdonald

the black queen, jumata emill

[aquotecollection]

Just because lots of people are experiencing something alongside you doesn’t make it any better. If anything, it’s harder because you’re not special.

Christina Sweeney-Baird, The End of Men

[librospdfgratismundoepub]

El fin de los hombres - Christina Sweeney-Baird (2021)

Glasgow, 2025. La doctora Amanda Maclean responde a una llamada para atender a un paciente con síntomas similares a los de la gripe. Pero, al cabo de tres horas, el paciente muere. Ese es el comienzo. El virus desconocido arrasa con el hospital a una velocidad mortífera. Todas las víctimas son hombres. La doctora Maclean da la voz de alarma. Pero para cuando las autoridades por fin le hacen caso,…

[radioactivesimsandstuff]

Book Review: The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

Book Review: The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird

5/5 Stars 416 pagesPublished April 27th 2021 by Doubleday Canada A book about a very unique end of the world as we know it kind of situation, we get to see everything happening through a multitude of different women. From reporters and doctors to stay at home mothers, and everything in between, all of it just really works well together. When a modern day plague takes out most of the world’s…