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This dystopian nightmare though has nothing to do with Covid-19, instead it is Neural Inflammatory Affliction (NIA) sweeping the globe. If contracted, it can mean a pilot suddenly can’t remember how to fly, a marathon runner forgets to stop running, or the sufferer wandering the streets aimlessly because they’ve forgotten where they live. Even more disturbing, for some people, it happens all at once, while others just gradually fade away. And there’s currently no cure. Vet tech Emma has experienced first-hand people who used greet her warmly now presenting blank-faced, while she worries about her ageing mother’s ability to get her husband’s name right. Then there’s Jude (Jack O’Connell) himself, a man who once “always had a camera in his hand and a photograph in his mind”. Recently, Emma has kept him under constant watch, looking for NIA symptoms, trying to keep his brain sharp with teasers and puzzles and fearing that – one day – she might wake up and he doe
Wed 5 May 2021 12.00 EDT
Once you get past its note of emo-mawkishness, thereâs something disquieting and poignant (and rather prescient) about this doomed love story of the future, from director Chad Hartigan and taken from a short story by LA author Aja Gabel.
Emma (Olivia Cooke) and Jude (Jack OâConnell) are a young couple living in an America ravaged by a pandemic causing memory loss. The disease has been causing planes to crash, because pilots suddenly forget how to fly, and marathon competitors to keep on running into the night because theyâve forgotten theyâre supposed to stop. The coupleâs best friends have been hit by the disease, and Emma and Jude are now themselves anxiously monitoring each other for the first signs of forgetfulness, and trying to hoard their romantic memories (so recently made) against the great forthcoming oblivion.
Ask a Book Critic: Books for a quarterlife crisis
Our critic recommends books to suit your very specific mood.
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Welcome to the latest installment of Vox’s
Ask a Book Critic, in which I, Vox book critic Constance Grady, provide book recommendations to suit your very specific mood: either how you’re feeling right now or how you’d like to be feeling instead.
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Ask a Book Critic always under 10 minutes long every two weeks wherever you listen to podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify.