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SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKS ARE MY BAG FICTION READERS AWARD ‘Stunning’ Maggie O’Farrell ‘Gorgeous, funny and deadly serious’ Max Porter ‘This is so good. We are not ready nor worthy’ Ocean Vuong An obligatory note of hope, in a world going to hell. ‘What are you afraid of, he asks me and the answer of course is dentistry, humiliation, scarcity, then he says what are your most useful skills? People think I’m funny.’ Lizzie Benson, a part-time librarian, is already overwhelmed with the crises of daily life when an old mentor offers her a job answering mail from the listeners of her apocalyptic podcast, Hell and High Water. Soon questions begin pouring in from left-wingers worried about climate change and right-wingers worried about the decline of Western civilization. Entering this polarized world, Lizzie is forced to consider who she is and what she can do to help: as a mother, as a wife, as a sister, and as a citizen of this doomed planet. ‘A barometer of how it feels to live now’ Sunday Times ‘No one writes about the intersection of love and existential despair like Jenny Offill’ Jia Tolentino, author of Trick Mirror