The Cabin at the End of the World

by Paul Tremblay
270 pgs

Wen, who is about to turn eight years old, and her two adoptive fathers, Andre and Eric, are staying at a rented cabin near a lake in New Hampshire. It's a remote cabin, without cell reception and a mile or so from its nearest neighbor. The perfect place for an extended vacation, where they can be alone as a family.

As the book begins, Wen is out capturing grasshoppers and delicately placing them inside a mason jar with a ventilated lid, when a large and friendly man jogs up the dirt road to the cabin and introduces himself as Leonard. Wen knows she's not supposed to talk to strangers, but Leonard is so friendly--even helping her catch a few more grasshoppers for her collection--and since Andrew and Eric are just on the other side of the cabin, Wen quickly relaxes and enjoys talking to her new friend for a few minutes.

But soon, when three more people--two women and another man all carrying strange, home-made weapons and dressed oddly similar to Leonard--appear at the bottom of the road and begin walking up to the cabin, Leonard's behavior changes and he tells Wen he and his friends need to talk to her and her dads about something very important.

Wen and her two dads try to barricade themselves inside the cabin, but Leonard and his friends are soon able to break in. Once inside, in an eerily calm and reasonable manner, they explain to the family of three that the world is going to end very soon, and the only way to stop it, is for Andrew, Eric, and Wen to voluntarily make a gut-wrenching sacrifice.

The Cabin at the End of the World is the type of book that will stick to your brain long after you finish the last page. It's a psychological horror story that keeps you off balance and uncertain of what you think you, and to say much more than that only risks ruining the experience for the next person. So that will have to do. It will not be long before I pick up another of Tremblay's books. I'm guessing it'll be around this coming Halloween.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★