Synopsis
At the end of the world, you much chose: survive and succeed or make peace with your failure – which will it be?
A.R.C Project Rebirth: a simple mission to outlive and outlast an inhospitable Earth and repopulate it once it has recovered. Yet, for Chloe, a cyborg member of the project, the operation is anything but simple. Extending well beyond its original completion date and with no signs of recovery, Chloe spends her days living in the past, avoiding her hot, dry, and barren reality, just waiting on the world to change.
When events take a sudden and disastrous turn for the worst, Chloe must compete against herself, her fellow project members, and even time itself, to keep herself and her precious cargo alive; humanity's fate depends on it. Faced with the possibility of not surviving, Chloe must reconcile between her past and present to decide – what mattered most?
The first time I read What Mattered Most I had planned to read the story in stages but by the time I was halfway through I knew there was no way I’d be able to concentrate on anything else until I found out what happened to Chloe. So yes, this genuinely was a story that I couldn’t stop reading!
Despite being a cyborg, I actually found Chloe to be a very realistic and relatable character. Through flashbacks we see a still human Chloe who wishes for a good life and the chance to one day become a parent. She initially believes others will solve her problems for her but steps up and volunteers to help when an opportunity presents itself. I believe the majority of readers will be able to relate to at least some of these aspects of Chloe’s character.
Similarly, I really liked the fact that Chloe was not a “chosen one” or someone destined to be a hero. She is an ordinary person who goes on to do extraordinary things. Sometimes she wins and sometimes she loses. This balance is one of reasons why Chloe is a great three-dimensional character.
As a fan of both the genres of science fiction and dystopian fiction, I believe Holland does an excellent job of combining the two genres. For example, the story features a dystopian setting with sci-fi technology. There is a good blend of the genres with neither one overpowering the other. We are given enough information to understand and visualise the world in which Chloe is in and the technology, such as Chloe’s cybernetic augments and the talkative drone companions, are both entertaining and help to progress the plot.
Ultimately this is a story of survival – both physical and mental. The tense final scenes were well written and I anxiously read on to find out which path Holland had chosen to end his story.
I found What Mattered Most dramatic, with an instantly engaging narrative and a complex protagonist. This has honestly become one of my new favourite short stories.
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