Unfortunately Hope, a History of the Future by G.G. Kellner simply wasn't for me. I did not like the writing style and thought the device of a story within a story was poorly executed since only one of the storylines was even slightly engaging, the other was populated by characters so flat that the most interesting one was a cat.
I read an ARC courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher, all opinions are my own.

A lyrically poetic story about a moment that the past and future collide in the most fantastical and terrifying ways. A family in 2037 find a book that seemingly was published, or is going to be published, in 2200, detailing humanities journey towards The Great Change and beyond. Mankind will have to endure great wars, climate shifts and devastation before they can finally attempt to build a world of peace and harmony with nature and each other.

This speculative eco-fiction was full of character, mysterious magical elements and most importantly, a seemingly timeless cat named Plato. We jump through time and space, to wildly reimagined real-life events in richly complex detail.

However, this was definitely an erratic read, jumping from perspectives, places and times without time to think, and around a third of the book filled with reimagined real-life documents like the Human Rights Declaration which could be of interest to some but left me thinking there was a lot more story than there was.

Thank you so much to Netgalley & G.G Kellner for this ARC

It publishes in 3 days and I am so glad I was able to read it.

Some parts of this book made me feel sick to my stomach as someone who does worry about climate change and the world's current affairs. But it made way to hope and what we can do to be better and do better.

It's confronting and it's captivating and 100% worth the read.

Thank you so much for the read

In this climate change novel meets speculative fiction, we're introduced to both a doomed fate and societal and cultural reclamation fueled by a catastrophic global reckoning with the fact the "The Time Before" was a sprint toward self-destruction. Heavy-handed in its messaging, but obviously what the world requires in order to take real action on the real life issues we face, the family who discovers the book from the future is also thinly developed, a tactic that I believe was intentional so as to create an "every-family" of the present for more universal resonance. We're meant to be able to see ourselves in them, not to have the scene brought to life for us. They could be anyone. They could be us. They are us.

I think other reviewers may be missing the veiled brilliance here - nuances of POV and intentionality of the way the book is written. The basic structure and "YA feel" of the way the book within the book's story is presented follows what it would probably look like for a society rebuilding to record events and capture to stories so they're not lost for posterity. Basic points. Economy of words. The symbolism of Hope/Plato and Alala, key animal totems in the book, underscores a prescience we humans haven't yet fully developed. Reading this book reminded me of listening to the song Imagine. A Utopia? Yes. And possible. The belief that it can and *should* be so it's what's missing for most people. I loved the fictional juxtaposition with actual historical documents. There are overt as well as deep and meaningful lessons here, if the reader is capable of seeing them.

The book started off with a really great hit. The description and cover are also pretty intriguing.
Whats more to like? - A book about a book or moreover a diary,

No this one's not from the past, but from Future.
But the sad part it the book could not hold off with the story when we progressed further. Grace's experience with the diary were a little predictable. Strange part is I saw the 1st episode of Solos. Coincidence at its best there too Anne Hathaway was trying to communicate with her future self.. n here the story was going on similar lines - only for the fact that nothing much apart from surrounding buildup happened here.
And that led to an overal not so wow reading experience. Maybe I will re read this somewhere time with afresh mind ... hopefully for better results

I did have a beautiful line that captured my attention:
"Water, water, cleanse my mind, Make me peaceful, make me kind. Water, water, cleanse my soul, Make me peaceful, make me whole."

Hope, a History of the Future certainly has a unique storyline that could intrigue readers, however, I had a difficult time getting into the novel as it got to be a lot.

Thank you to SparkPress & NetGalley for its ARC.

This is going to be a tough review for me to write. I think the author of this book, G. G. Kellner, has the best of intentions when writing, Hope: a History of The Future. Her warnings about the devastating consequences of Global Warming are sincere and heartfelt. She is presenting a possible future where the world is in chaos. With rising sea-levels comes flooding of low laying lands. Higher temperatures mean food shortages, and instability. And society has completely broken down.

However, there is no actual story in this book.

What I Didn't Like:

There are two families presented. In the near future there is Joyce and her blended family. Joyce finds a book that purports to be a history of the world and that it is written in the year 2200. The future. Joyce, and eventually her whole family, read about what happens in the future, and seriously believe this is a magical book that is telling them about what will happen. It would have been an eerie twist if there had been references to any of the family in the magical book. If that happened, it would have at least been plausible for the characters to believe this was a real document about the future. However, this doesn't happen. All they can talk about is global warming. You barely get a chance to know who these people are or anything. They have no other purpose in the story than to react to the book.

In the book Joyce is reading, there is a history of what happens through a diary of someone's great-grandmother. Again, there is very little character development. All the characters talk about is climate change. The main characters in this part of the story go on a long journey on a boat to escape what they fear is happening. While their tale of survival is compelling, there was very little character development during what would be a life-altering experience. In their two (or three) year trip, there was zero friction between the characters. No one got on each other's nerves. There was no self-doubt about if they were doing the right thing. I found that to be wildly unrealistic.

Plus, the society that eventually forms out of this is a ridiculous utopia. There is no money, everyone adheres to a Universal Bill of Rights, and (again) there is absolutely no conflict. Overall, I found this novel to be preach and heavy-handed. In a story, the characters have to change over time. This never happened. There are other books where climate change is a major theme, but there is an actual story. Check out Gravity is Heartless by Sarah Lahey. These books are character driven and are really wonderful.

This story was quite delightful, and an easy read, but not quite my cup of tea. I always find climate change related fiction a little bit unnerving, and I wouldn’t have chosen to read this novel if I knew that this was the main theme.

The characters were charming, though, and I especially enjoyed Plato the cat. So, not my cup of tea, but I’m sure many other readers who prefer this genre will absolutely love this novel.

Thank you very much to NetGalley and Spark Press for the opportunity to read this ARC!

Climate change books are relatively new to me, but I'm really enjoying them. This one is a work of fiction and tells a cautionary tale of what may happen if we (humankind) continue on the trajectory we're on without taking measures to improve the climate. That may sound all doom and gloom but this novel is actually pretty light. What I loved is the hint of magic that is threaded throughout as the story largely takes place through a mysterious book that was published in the future. I also really enjoyed reading some of the historical documents the author included as she makes the point that we already have some of the groundwork laid for necessary change. As a cat-lover, I liked the inclusion of the character of Plato/hope. I felt that the book left me with a lot of questions but I think that's the point- to compel us to action so that we can finish the story.

This was a quick enjoyable read about a heavy topic. It gave me real Fern Gully vibes and I think its perfect for Earth Day 🌎

Hope, a History of the Future is a story of a family that finds a strange book from the future. The book tells of climate disasters and how things changed over time. I found it ok., it was a very quick read, and did not go deep into characters or anything. The different family members kind of freaked out and cried an awful lot over things that were not really explained. The story does jump around a lot so be prepared.

A unique concept that I enjoyed, but got a little lost since the book was a bit convoluted. Engaging storyline though, just has to push myself to get through it.

Thank you to Netgalley for this eARC in exchange for an honest review!

A unique concept…… The book was thought provoking as it really opened my eyes to the scary and endless possibilities of what could happen if we carry on treating the Earth and each other in the way we currently do.

I really tried to make it through this book but it just wasn’t for me and that’s fine! Not all books are for everyone. Dnf @ 30 %

This climate fiction book has an interesting premise: a book on the history of the effects of climate change on society, published almost 200 years in the future, keeps insinuating itself on a present day family. As different members of the family read the parts of the book that they find it open to, we learn how our current climate crisis develops, how the world falls apart, and rebuilds itself. The story of the family and their encounters with the book is not as interesting as the book within the book. The discussion/lesson on climate change seems a bit heavy handed at times and the family narrative is distractedly stiff. I would have preferred just to read the book within the book. The premise is interesting, but in this work, it distracted from the future it was portraying.

I stopped reading about halfway through. Going by the writing style, I felt that the book was written for younger readers, possibly teenagers. The language was plain and unengaging. The story bounced from the present to a near future to a farther future that did not make sense. The storytelling wasn’t very good and what should have been compelling wasn’t. When I got to the stage where I asked myself why I was still reading this book, I stopped reading. Thank you to Netgalley and SparkPress for the digital review copy.

Stories within a story. That's what initially drew me to the book. It was about generations and legends and family. The premise is really interesting and cool, and normally I really enjoy non-chrononilogical storytelling. However, I found Hope, A History of the Future to be confusing. I got lost between different characters' POVs and the amount of jumps between the timelines. The actual stories from the Grandmother were beautifully written, though, and that helped maintain my interest in it.

I want to preface this by saying I truly do hate giving this book a 1-star rating, it may be closer to a 1.5. I so wanted to enjoy this book, the premise was interesting, I thought it was going to be a good length to explore both the readers and the "history" portions of this story. There was my first mistake. The page count that you see on this book is inaccurate. The novel itself is just around 200 pages and the remaining 100 pages are full of unabridged historical documents like the US Constitution. Why? Did it need to be a certain length for publication? This felt utterly unnecessary though it feels like the author and publisher thought this was critical and potentially groundbreaking...?

While this premise was interesting, half of this story was utterly unnecessary. The family "finding" the history of the future was poorly fleshed out, their encounters with the book rang pretty hollow. They barely questioned if this was real and just all started crying. I found myself skimming through the pages where the only characters that felt different from each other was one who was sick and one who smoked.

The more compelling pieces of Hope exist within the History of the Future; however, even that was not without its faults. It just felt like a saccrine attempt at taking a brief view into the future so that all learn lessons and fix things before the "Great Change."

SPOILERS
The logic of a collapse of human civilizations that can somehow turn around and without power, communications, resources,etc. manage to found a utopian world government in 100 years crumbles if you think about it for more than a second. Also Hope/Plato the cat... was it immortal? The author would like us to believe the same cat pops up in 2030 and 2200 based on the ending. Who was the woman next door to the family? Why was she even added? Also *oooooooo spooooooky* after the family reads this 2 dimensional doom and gloom vision of our potential future the pages mysteriously turn blank

Hope: A History of the Future is a book about climate change, the imminent future, and the hope we may or may not still have. (And also a seemingly immortal cat.)

I really liked this book, even though it took me a while to get through. Initially, the way things were told non-chronologically gets a little confusing, but for some reason, that way of telling the story made me even more intrigued to keep going.

Most of the characters were interesting enough, though I felt like fewer characters would’ve probably made the book a little less confusing. (I ended up just writing down all the names, and maybe this is just me having a bad memory for names, but I struggled a bit to keep all the characters in mind and how they were related to each other.)

Also: The cat truly was the star of this book. It’s not a big part of the book, but I loved how this fricking cat just kept appearing everywhere, seemingly immortal and capable of who knows what else.

Despite the confusion, I really enjoyed the book. This book is a dystopia, but it ends on a quite hopeful note, which I certainly needed after some of the more dire descriptions of the future this book imagines.

I was really drawn into this by the premise of the story but unfortunately I just could not get into the writing. It was confusing jumping back and forth between timelines and the writing style was so very different between the family reading the book and the story inside of the book. Also just given current events a lot of this made me feel pretty depressed - it wasn't what I was expecting.

Thank you to NetGalley, SparkPress, and G.G. Kellner for this digital advanced reader’s copy in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley, SparkPress, and G.G. Kellner for this digital advanced reader’s copy in exchange for an honest review.

I was immediately drawn to this novel because of the black cat on the cover and the premise of a book falling through time.

I felt like the novel was written almost by two different authors. The Grandmother’s story was melodic, beautifully written, and flowed perfectly. It conveyed the message of urgency against climate change while always carrying a message of hope, peace, and recovery. The characters from the future had depth and personality. However, the juxtaposition between her story and the story of the family who discovers the futuristic book in the past is severely lacking. I could not connect with those characters at all, nor understand the family’s relationship to the book other than it showed up in their house. The constant switching between family members reading on their own messed with the reader’s ability to immerse themselves in the future’s “history”. We also learn very little about Hope, the cat, other than being a symbol if constancy throughout the story

I would recommend this book for those interested in Climate Fiction and clean/cozy fiction (there is no cursing or love scenes). It is definitely very light on the fantasy and I am not sure why it is marketed as women’s fiction, either. In a time when everyone is on edge with global problems, it does certainly offer a glimmer of hope towards our future.