The Compound
By Aisling Rawle
Penguin Random House
Aisling Rawle’s debut novel, “The Compound,” has been described as “'Love Island' meets 'The Lord of the Flies,'” but the literary classic quoted in the book’s opening pages is George Orwell’s “Animal Farm.”
Specifically, the moment when Mollie, a white mare, asks whether there will be sugar after the rebellion, and whether she’ll be allowed to wear ribbons in her mane.
Snowball, the pig, replies, “Those ribbons that you are so devoted to are the badge of slavery. Can you not understand that liberty is worth more than ribbons?” Orwell writes, “Mollie agreed, but she did not sound very convinced.”
Why? Because although Snowball dismisses Mollie’s questions as silly, they get at a larger philosophical question: How much are we willing to sacrifice to have things that bring us joy?
That's what 19 attractive young singles who live together in a big rundown house must determine for themselves while starring in an unnamed, near-future reality show.
At the novel's start, Lily, a conventionally beautiful 21 year old who describes herself as passive ("it is both my worst quality and the thing that people like most about me"), wakes up alongside Jacintha. The pair roam the compound – surrounded by a desert, with wildfires visible in the distance – to find the other eight female contestants. Nine men, meanwhile, show up the next day, following a harrowing trek through the desert that claims one contestant, who goes missing, and physically and emotionally scars another.
We never learn exactly what happened to him, just as we only get hints of what the eco-troubled world far outside the compound is now like. There are multiple mentions of intense heat, and the fires, and the still-young contestants' expectation to live only another 15-20 years. As Lily floats in the pool on her first day, looking up at the sky, she notes that it's a different color blue from the one she was used to seeing: "It was clear, entirely untouched by clouds or smog, with no tall buildings to block out great chunks of it, nor artificial lights to disguise its hues." Rawle's sly gift for evoking a hauntingly absent hellscape beyond the perimeter stokes the narrative's stakes to a high level, even as the contestants do predictably humiliating reality TV "challenges" like publicly ranking all the men and women by their attractiveness. (Lily ranks second among the women, which naturally serves her well.)
Lily also finds ghostly traces of those who previously lived in the house. The female contestants decide to clean up before the men appear. Lily says, "I picked up a half-eaten apple from the windowsill of the kitchen, around which fruit flies had begun to swarm. The inside of the apple was brown, but not rotten. I reckoned it had been eaten a day ago, maybe less. As I was throwing it out, I saw greasy paper plates and pizza boxes in the bin."
These subtle hints makes the novel all the more creepy, as we're left to wonder what happened to the people who so recently called this place their temporary home.
Ultimately, Rawle's instinct to set a reality dating show in a post-apocalyptic world feels like a strange-but-dead-on stroke of genius. The show has rigid rules: Contestants can't share anything about themselves or their lives on the outside with each other. They can't acknowledge that they're on a show. And they can't discuss the personal challenges sent from the show's producers (for coveted rewards), causing contestants to never completely trust each other's words and actions. Plus, when someone wakes up in bed alone, they're automatically eliminated and banished to the desert, so the pressure to partner up with someone of the opposite sex is intense, immediate, and constant.
But how loyal can you expect a stranger to be? And what are you willing to do to stay in the game when the world is (literally) on fire?
As the contestants' numbers shrink, and the community and personal challenges grow more manipulative (at one point, Lily begins to believe the producers don't want her to succeed), the plotting among those who remain gets violent and ruthless. The women realize that they have to use strategy to overcome physical deficits. (All while sharing a bed each night with these men, of course.)
The show's winner gets to stay at the house (which is, by this time, more comfortable, with more amenities) for as long as he/she wishes, and receives whatever item they ask for from producers as long as they stay.
But – to circle back to "Animal Farm" – would luxuries feel like enough in a lost, misbegotten world? Particularly when you've become someone you might not even recognize in the desperate race to win them?
That question, along with which character will be left facing that choice, may keep you up reading "The Compound" past your bedtime.
Some slick summer-beach-reads-with-substance are simply worth the inevitable book hangover.
