Although this is the fourth novel by Claire North, itself only one of three names by which the author goes by, The End of the Day felt like a very different creature to her previous work. During the interview I had with her last year, North referred to The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, Touch and The Sudden Appearance of Hope as her 'people with problems', but with The End of the Day, the construct appears to be reversed. Charlie is not the one with the problem, nor indeed is his employer - it's everyone else who is causing the issues. Quite possibly North's angriest novel yet, the book bristles with indignation at the state of the world, with the chapters inter-cut with snippets of dialogue which one cannot help but think have been cut from real life.

The story centres around Charlie, a young man at that stage of life where taking jobs on the basis of them being interesting seems like a good idea. This is how he ended up as the Harbinger of Death - Death comes to us all, but on special occasions, he sends Charlie ahead, sometimes as a marker that death is imminent, other times as a simple warning. It's a job with decent pay and involves a good deal of travel - who's to complain? All the arrangements go through the Milton Keynes office and Charlie's contact with his employer is fairly minimal - fleeting glimpses across a glacier, that type of thing. Charlie visits an elderly lady who is the last remaining speaker of a language, another who is the last nun of an ancient order, he visits an old man in a housing estate at risk of demolition - Charlie is there to honour what has gone before.

As with North's previous works, there is a lot of voyaging back and forth and all of it occurs with apparent ease. Having recently completed a long-haul flight, I found this harder to overcome than I had previously. Stranger too was the fact that North narrates this novel in the third person, leaving the reader at one remove from the story and feeling like a distinct shift in style. To make matters all the stranger, while in North's other novels, the various strange happenings were discreetly understood in closed communities (the Cronus Club being my favourite example), the plots did unfold in worlds otherwise identical to our own. Harry August navigated his way across Blitz-torn London by keeping an approximate memory of where the housing estates would be in the future. In Touch, a sexually aggressive politician is ruined by being possessed and then forced to utter a racial slur against a political figure who seems to have been Barrack Obama. Charlie's world is a little different. As the Harbinger of Death, he is a minor celebrity - when he is spotted somewhere, people wonder what is about to happen. Callers complain on the radio that Death is interfering too much in the lives of humans, "Who the [expletive] does he think he is, Death, getting involved in a political issue like this? Sure, we all know him, we all respect him, primal force of the universe and that, but really, if he wants to stick his nose into public affairs, then there are more appropriate channels ...". The Harbingers of War, Disease and Famine sometimes meet up with Charlie to discuss their work. There is a detached acceptance of these figures of the Apocalypse even though so few people have met them in person.

The depictions of death in fiction are always fascinating - they reveal so much about us. My personal favourite has to be that of the late Sir Terry Pratchett - a kindly figure who tries so hard to understand humanity, Death rides Binky and cares for his granddaughter Susan. Occasionally he takes a holiday. A traditionalist, he sticks with the scythe even though Deaths within other dimensions have upgraded to the combine harvester. But equally intriguing is the one which steps out from the shadows within the final volume of His Dark Materials, when Lyra is introduced to her Death, who has been with her since the moment of her birth, as close to her as her beloved daemon Pantalaimon. The implication is that because of our own fear of death, it conceals itself politely, but it is there just the same and not to be feared. North's version of Death feels more akin to this - Charlie has a mobile number on which to reach him, but he has the feeling that this is really not somebody to be disturbed. Everyone who does see Death sees him slightly differently - some as female, some as male, sometimes on a horse, but always they are afraid. And it is this fear of death which makes Charlie's job so very difficult. No matter how many times he patiently explains that in certain cases, he is just a warning, still people are enraged at the sight of him, furious at the reminder that they are mortal.

The End of the Day feels like a novel that does not really care for people. The ghastly asides which intersperse the chapters make for really grim reading - I was particularly caught by the one immediately before Chapter 38 where someone is addressing 'the lighting girl' and while assuring her that they trust her 'artistic judgment' and that they know 'nothing' about lighting, they are still going to tell her exactly what they want. It's worth noting that Catherine Webb, aka Claire North when she's at home, is a lighting engineer as her day job so this is very likely something which was said to her directly. People fume over Brexit, the stupidity of others, the way that the modern news cycle is becoming akin to the lifespan of a may-fly, discuss food, their health, it's a whirl of the inane, the insensitive, the innocuous and the intriguing. In a strange way, despite its unusual premise, North has done a pretty remarkable job of capturing the current world mood - it's all a bit pissed off.

There is an anger about the entitlement of certain people, a feeling that they have the right to trample on the happiness, feelings, rights of others. The old man in the council flat and his granddaughter don't matter. Even if they kick up the biggest fuss they can, the most they can get is a three hour news cycle. Rich people pay their other rich friends, they get what they want and the world moves on. The problem with Charlie though is that he cannot play by these rules - he cannot be bought or paid to go away. There are scenes of shocking violence where someone has demanded a bargaining, believing their money is enough to make Death pass them by. It's an interesting point - in a world that can seem shockingly unfair, where the elite appear to trample over the wishes of those they see as beneath them, we are still all accountable to Death.

How indeed should one respond to Charlie? Many do in shock, some are briskly dismissive and refuse to be afraid, some refuse to take whatever it is he brings them, seeing it as a curse. Some take it as an honour, a chance to tell their story. Charlie likes to listen. He is a classic Everyman figure - a stark contrast to so many of North's other protagonists. He is an ordinary man doing his best, polite and patient and trying to please. We see him in war zones, in icy tundra, in the bustle of a city, in pain, afraid and even on occasion contented. Charlie is human. He is the Harbinger, the one who goes before. Like so many of us, Charlie has met Death, who once came and sat next to him while the boy Charlie was waiting by his father's hospital bed. Charlie knows that Death will not always look the same - sometimes female, sometimes male, sometimes with a scythe, sometimes atop a horse but always, always recognisable for who they are. As Charlie observes, the question of who or what Death is, 'It’s the oldest question; maybe the very first question ever asked. The dead can’t tell us, the dying don’t have the language to explain. The only guaranteed part of our lives is the one thing we cannot express, control or command. It comes and are we are… so afraid. Too afraid to look. Too afraid to understand.'

It is becoming increasingly clear that North is one of the rising stars of he genre - her writing is both thought-provoking and highly entertaining. Even the throw-away lines are well-crafted and packed with wit. The Milton Keynes office will call Charlie to confirm travel arrangements and lament that he must be having better weather than them, since back there it's 'pissing like an elephant with cystatis'. In another place, Charlie catches himself listening to music 'sung in Danish in a style that was best described as Abba without joy'. A scientist clings to Charlie and pronounces that 'Reason is dead. We killed it', but in and among the moments of darkest melancholy, there is humour, there are moments to distract you from the novel's ultimate pessimism. The End of the Day is a book that leaves one pondering. We are in a bewildering world, chapters draw to a close every day - I feel that this is one of those few novels which captures the annoying fact that life is what happens when you aren't looking. The endless hum of meaningless conversation - these are the people we rub shoulders with every day. With this latest novel, North seems to be protesting the state of our world as well as somehow trying to celebrate all that should be honoured about life. While these themes may seem to be in conflict, she is able to draw them together with ease. It's strange - this is too close to our world to be classed as dystopic fiction and there is no clear apocalypse in evidence, but yet North seems to leave us teetering on the brink. Far more meditative than her previous work, it feels less like the end but rather like a new chapter in her writing. I can't wait to see which direction she takes next.

Brilliant but odd - The premise is interesting - the harbinger of death can be positive - aiming to honour as well as warn. The book tells the story of several different people and their journeys, including Charlie (who I thought was fab).
Although Claire North's writing is intriguing and mysterious, the book lost its way on several occasions.

I loved elements of this book, but not sure it fully came together (or if it even needed to)... 3.5* from me

Straight out of college Charlie applies for an unusual job, Harbinger of Death. His role is to travel to visit people indicated on his calendar and give them a gift. Sometimes he is there because the person will die, sometimes as a courtesy and sometimes because it is something bigger that will die. When Charlie falls in love he becomes more philosophical about his role and when he meets the rich and powerful Patrick he realises that more is at stake than just the death of a few individuals.

I loved the premise of this book, that the four dooms as amongst us and manipulating events and that Death has a right-hand man. The little vignettes about Charlie's assignments were well-written and make the reader really think. Some of the linking elements were a little confusing but I liked the overall message about man's relationships with man and also with the planet. This was a profound book which also entertains.

've been a fan of Claire North (in all her authorial guises) for many years. The concept of The End of the Day sounded like perfect fodder for her formidable imagination and her ability to write page-turners with a touch of the fantastic and a great deal of heart.
Charlie takes a job as the Harbinger of Death, the one who Goes Before, sometimes as a warning and sometimes as a courtesy. Often Death follows. His work takes him from his home in London to Greenland, to Syria, Nigeria and others. Against the background of his journeys there are glimpses of other Harbingers and their bosses, the entities themselves - Death, Famine, War, Pestilence. As well as countless snatches of other voices debating holding forth their views on the problems of our times.

At first I enjoyed the fragmentary narrative, the main plot interrupted by these soundbite-like interludes but after as the story moved it failed to really progress or coalesce it became more frustrating than interesting.

Claire North confronts a lot of the injustice, unpleasantness and selfishness in the world against the backdrop of death (or is that Death?) the greatest leveller of all. North had always been a socially aware writer and I've always admired her ability to weave these themes seamlessly into her stories. Unfortunately she tries to take on too much on The End of the Day, it feels as though she had tried to cram all of the world's ills into a narrative that just can't support them and while so much if it is worthy it often lapses into sentimentality and lacks the subtlety needed to make it a stronger piece of writing.

At one time Charlie is asked whether he is just the Harbinger for the UK or whether he travels and I wonder if whether Death had been given a global team of Harbingers and Charlie's efforts had been focused in a single place it would have allowed for a tighter, more manageable ​story. Instead the weight of all the issues overwhelm the imagination and the plot which are usually get greatest strengths. Even the characters are somewhat lost in the narrative.

There are some intensely moving passages but it is the simpler stories rather than the extraordinary tragedies that are the most successful in the context of this story and they are definitely the most convincing.

Did not finish. I will only review if I complete a book.