Late To The Trend: Bird Box by Josh Malerman

My toxic trait is always being late to the party. Both in real life and in currently trending pop culture discussions. It is a wonder I made it on the Stranger Things bandwagon as early as I did. I have not stayed on said wagon, but that is beside the point. Back in 2018 when the Netflix sensation starring Sandra Bullock, “Bird Box” was released, I had not fallen in love with the horror genre quite yet. For some reason unknown to me now, I decided to watch the movie which was receiving high praise from almost everyone I knew. I ended up loving the film and recommending it to anyone who would listen. Soon after, I found out the film was based on Josh Malerman’s 2014 novel of the same name. Being the avid reader I am, I wanted to read the book to see how it compared. As the hype quickly faded, as trends tend to do, I kept putting off reading the book. Fast forward to December of 2023. I have just completed my reread of The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and I am desperate for more dystopian fiction. On a whim, I download Bird Box by Josh Malerman on my Kindle right before boarding an airplane. Three and a half hours later, I am almost done with the book and I didn’t take my eyes off the page the entire flight. I now fully regret that I had not read the book sooner. Despite having seen the movie and remembering most of the story, I was completely engrossed from page one.

Unknown beings have appeared on Earth. Once glance is enough to fracture the human mind driving the viewer to fatal violence. Five years into the apocalypse, we follow Malorie as she embarks on a journey with two young children to travel to a rumored safe house in hopes of finding refuge. They must travel 20 miles by boat while blindfolded. Malorie will rely on the listening skills that she has diligently cultivated in the four-year-old children since birth to guide their way. Jumping between the present and the past, Malerman crafts a suspenseful thriller reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road that lays bare a parent’s resilience and abounding love for their children.

Besides the completely unique and creative premise Malerman presents, he also dives into and exposes the complexity of the human psyche. He does this subtly. Using dialogue, interactions between characters, and character’s reactions in this high-stress situation. Malerman realizes that once it becomes a matter of life or death, a human’s true morality is shown. Whether good, bad, or gray, Malerman crafts characters that act on their natural instinct for survival and fear of the unknown. This creates a realistic story that parallels the recent COVID-19 pandemic. It is easy to understand the seemingly extreme actions taken by the characters having witnessed similar reactions in recent years. From conspiracy theorists to deniers, Malerman understood how we as humans might tend to react to an uncontainable and confusing force that we witness killing our loved ones with little hope of stopping it.

While some turned to violence and sought opportunities to gain power, others showed compassion and attempts at human preservation. Malorie is in the unique situation of caring for two children who were born into this nightmare world. Not even able to bring herself to name the children, she refers to them as “boy” and “girl”. Showing little maternal nurturing out of necessity for their survival. It is indisputable that she loves the children fiercely and will do anything to protect them. She puts all of their lives at risk in hopes of creating a better life for them. Between their harrowing journey down the river and slowly discovering how Malorie ended up as the sole protector of two children, I was enthralled and desperate to see how their journey would end.

I look forward to reading the sequel Malorie (published in 2019) and hopefully getting more answers about the strange new world and creatures that now threaten the human race. If you are a fan of The Road by Cormac McCarthy or even “The Purge” movies, I highly recommend giving this a read and watching the movie. Sandra Bullock in a horror movie… you can’t miss that!

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