In an apocalyptic world where fires ravage acre upon acre of land and the globe has entered a perpetually hot summer, a young mother struggles to make the correct decision about moving her children to one of the few unscathed remnants of countryside remaining. Meanwhile, the skies in the City turn orange with toxins, and millions of climate migrants flee north in the hopes of being allowed to cross a carefully regulated northern border. Are these headlines from the latest morning or evening news, or are they the scenes from Roz Dineen’s riveting novel Briefly Very Beautiful? If one cannot differentiate between the factual scenes and the fictional ones, perhaps that gives one even more reason to read Dineen’s epic novel of love, resilience, and female fortitude in an imploding world ravaged by war and pollution. Of course, part of the novel’s haunting effect is its eerie correlation to real-world events that no longer shock us, but after we finish Briefly Very Beautiful, we come to look at such news stories from a completely new perspective.
Briefly Very Beautiful follows the story of Cass, a young woman whose husband, Nathaniel, has ventured to war to serve as a burns specialist. As Cass navigates solo motherhood, she must also navigate the everchanging dynamics of the slowly dying place she calls home—the City. After terrorist attacks force Cass and her three children to leave their home, Cass finds herself at the mercy of her strange, manipulative mother-in-law Eden. No matter what images of peace and utopia her mother-in-law’s name might conjure, Cass’ stay with Eden at her estate is anything but peaceful and idyllic. The tumultuous relationship Cass has with Eden—and the fact that Cass and her children must become refugees that flee to the northern border—makes up a significant portion of the novel—and probably for good reason. The Cass-Eden relationship serves as a small examination about how—perhaps someday—those who lay claim to wealth and property will be the only ones who have access to an endless array of supplies and necessities. They will also, more significantly, be the only ones who will gain access to semi-unpolluted landscapes where they can live free from over-pollution and overpopulation. Thus, the novel serves as a clear warning about the wealth disparity perpetuating the globe.
The novel dares to examine society’s superficiality by taking a subtle stab at an overreliance on an entity most individuals have come to take for granted—internet access. In Dineen’s book, Cass and her neighbors rarely have access to the internet, and the media—as well as other resources—are strictly controlled by a strange, mysterious group known as Black Box. In one stark scene, a few of Cass’ acquaintances are discussing their lives on the day the internet ceased working and how their lives basically disappeared once the internet died. These reflections about life-sans-internet bear a striking similarity to real-life headlines discussing internet addiction, the false narratives published by disinformation groups, and the increasing number of studies directed at social media’s effects on adolescent brains. In Dineen’s apocalyptic world, the internet-less are forced to communicate with their neighbors and rely on rumors shared verbally. Therefore, misinformation and disinformation take on an entirely new form.
Centering Briefly Very Beautiful, too, is the subplot focused on the building of a wall between that separates the southern part of the country from the northern one. Only a select few are able to cross the border, and, at one point, we see Cass desperately trying to justify why her children lay claim to what lies on the border’s northern side. Nonetheless, its Dineen’s own portrayal of the wall that will remind Western readers—and particularly American ones—of news stories straight from CNN and other American media outlets. At one point, Cass notes that, “The north was slowly putting up a wall, a border to keep the climate migrants from the south out.” In another scene, Cass observes that one source “did not investigate its [the wall’s] funding nor cite a single source,” while another story detailed “how the border was run day to day, and gave thumbnail profiles of the people who’d been turned away.” More significantly, the source Cass reads “did not offer any condemnation of the wall,” which she found “strange.” The wall, however, is not simply a wall. It is actually a symbol, representing the threshold humankind can cross. In one direction, it can begin toward reclaiming the Earth from climate change and restoring its environments. In the other, humankind can speed headlong toward an apocalypse of its own making.
Motherhood is another of Briefly Very Beautiful’s themes that we cannot overlook. While contemporary novels like Linh Ly Is Doing Just Fine briefly dance with the millennial and Gen Z recognition of climate change and ask the question “Why should we bring a new generation into this?” Dineen’s novel tackles the question force. Specifically, it uses Nathaniel’s first two wives as an example of women who recognized that the world in which their children would grow was actually no world at all. Nathaniel contemplates his own personal theory that his first two wives “left life because they could not bear reality” because they “saw how the world was turning,” that it was “on a quick trajectory to its end”—and that end was inevitable. His first two wives “could not witness the death of the world with their own children in it.” Cass, however, stands in stark contrast to Nathaniel’s first two wives. To our surprise, Cass’ fortitude and desire to provide her children with a life much better than the one they have initially been given is what motivates her pursue a life on the other side of the border separating the south from the north. Her motivation and fortitude mirror the real-life stories of refugees—particularly those at the United States’ southern border—who risk life, limb, and everything they own in order to make a better life elsewhere.
And, if one interprets Briefly Very Beautiful as a climate change migration survival manual, then they will find a few useful—and deeply philosophical—anecdotes that are quite noteworthy. Cass’ experiences as a mother fighting against all odds to protect her children and ensure their survival becomes an examination of emotional and mental strength during times of extreme distress. If one has ever wondered what it is like to flee an environment in order to survive, Cass offers us some insights about summoning their internal fortitude and facing our fears. We find chilling, introspective pieces of advice like “You will get the children out of there. You will carry them away.” We also find prophetic warnings such as “You will be subjected to the horrors of obsessive thinking, remembering how every advert, how every item bought, how every drink, every sugary high and every aspiration you held only contributed to this destruction, to this chain of interconnected events.” Thus, while Briefly Very Beautiful dissects how by “the time those in power had no choice but to act on behalf of life, it was too late,” the novel as a whole is call for individual action, a reminder that even the smallest contributions to what should be a global effort of preserving the Earth and its resources for future generations, and a better life for all can make a difference.
In this her debut novel, Dineen wows and awes audiences with poetic, philosophical writing that leaves us saddened at the current state of climate change affairs but with a small sliver of hope that the course toward destruction might yet be altered. Briefly Very Beautiful blends the apocalyptic speculation of George R. Stewart’s Earth Abides and the climate change advocacy of Alison Stine’s Trashlands to form what may be the most powerful petition for climate action the 2020s has thus far seen.
Briefly Very Beautiful, by Roz Dineen. New York, New York: The Overlook Press, July 2024. 336 pages. $28.00, hardcover.
Nicole Yurcaba (Нікола Юрцаба) is a Ukrainian American of Hutsul/Lemko origin. A poet and essayist, her poems and reviews have appeared in Appalachian Heritage, Atlanta Review, Seneca Review, New Eastern Europe, and Ukraine’s Euromaidan Press. Nicole holds an MFA in Writing from Lindenwood University, teaches poetry workshops for Southern New Hampshire University, and is the Humanities Coordinator at Blue Ridge Community and Technical College. She also serves as a guest book reviewer for Sage Cigarettes, Tupelo Quarterly, Colorado Review, and Southern Review of Books.
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