Cover Image: World Without End

World Without End

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Member Reviews

A graphic novel dealing with the highly relevant topic of climate change and what we can do about it. However, the implementation could have been better.

No matter what our age, gender, race, religion or nationality, we cannot escape from the consequences of our actions. As the heat wave in Europe soars to unimaginable levels and flash floods and intense rains are becoming a common occurrence every year during the Indian monsoon, it is high time we reflect on our habits and how we can be more eco-friendly. This is where the book comes in.

Christophe Blain, the artist, meets with Jean-Marc Jancovici of Carbone 4 and The Shift Project to bring to us this bande desinée focussing on the topic that binds all our fates. Why and how we use energy, why we shifted from renewable energy to fossil fuels, to what extent have renewable and clean energy sources replaced the fossil fuels, should we go back to renewables resources – all these questions and many more are answered.
The solutions provided are not so extreme that would sound impossible but easy-to-implement changes in our lifestyle. Most of which we already know, but don’t follow. The most important thing this book does is show you ‘perspective’. The energy problem isn’t so distant in the future, and your role isn’t as tiny as you would imagine.

The illustrations are outstanding and balance the serious content with an ample dose of humour. However, I wish the content had been more simplified. It becomes too statistical or economics-intensive at times. The idea of the book is to make the common person aware of their environmental responsibilities. But if the lay reader doesn’t even understand the data, how will they realise the extent of the problem? The approach should have been less like a lecture and more like a chat.

I can honestly say that this is one of the scariest books I have read. 😟 It almost feels like it is too late to save the planet and our children have unimaginably dreary futures ahead. But as Jancovici says in one of the panels, “We can’t wait for science to provide minutely detailed observations of every danger before getting our asses in gear.” All of us must start thinking green ASAP!

You can take this book as a depressing novel, or as an exaggeration, or as a clarion call to change your routine habits. The choice is in your hands, as is the planet’s future.

Recommended for sure, but be prepared for a data-intensive and mentally exhausting read.

3.5 stars, rounding up for the intent.

My thanks to Europe Comics and NetGalley for the DRC of “World Without End”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

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Wow. This French graphic novel packed one hell of a punch. Created in partnership with Engineer and expert Jean-Marc Janovici and artist Christophe Blain and recently released in English for the first time this June, World Without End is a detailed look at Energy (and it’s systems) and how these forces impact our economy, population growth, and our environment presented in a clear, easy to digest format.

While this was a very comprehensible read, the content is dense and I found the need to take breaks to process some of the content to ensure I absorbed it properly. It was also refreshing, as an American reader, to take in more non English based content from experts in the field.

The creators did try to leave readers on a positive “we can still adjust our path of humanity as a whole is willing to make some compromises” vibe. Unfortunately for me, the last few years have so severely eroded my faith in the collective humanity of the world that I ended this book feeling pretty helpless honestly. THAT SAID I absolutely recommend this book to anyone wanting to dig into these subject and looking for a well researched and easily understood place to start.

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An excellent book and so educational, very concise and to the point, explaining the issues of global warming, its causes and development, as well as energy resources. You can tell the authors are quite knowledgeable about the subject, yet have cared to make it accesible for the layperson without dumbing anything down.

Even if simplified, it's still a complex topic, and at times the book isn't that easily readable, because there are portions that will be quite demanding intellectually for the reader with no background in scientific fields, stuff like physics, for example, but it's all really very well explained and the illustrations help the reader understand better. I also commend that the authors didn't stop at merely alarming the reader with the climate issues we're facing, which are rightfully concerning, but also propose solutions that they believe would work. Very recommended!

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The subject matter is extremely important and relevant, and it's easy to tell that the creators of this work know exactly what they are talking about and are passionate about it. While a graphic novel is a slightly more accessible and digestible form of taking in information, this graphic novel still reads like a lecture. A lecture with hand drawn images instead of powerpoint clip art. This lecture feel made it hard to keep my attention.

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Thank you to Europe Comics and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

World Without End by Christophe Blain and Jean-Marc Jancovici is a graphic novel about climate change and the importance of combating climate change. The book is about how we as a society have become too dependent on fossil fuels, leading to changes to our planet that are destructive and consequential.

Overall, World Without End is clearly a graphic novel with an important message. One highlight of this book is how it talks about climate change. I think it's so important for each of us to do our part for the planet. I did take off 2 stars, because I wasn't a fan of the artwork. I was expecting more of a graphic novel, but this just felt like reading infographics in a science textbook. It didn't maintain my interest. If you're intrigued by the description, you can check out this book, which is available now.

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This was a very informative and thorough reading about climate change, ecology, sustainability and the science behind all of those. You can see that the writer has a very deep knowledge of the topics, but the illustrations are at points chaotic and make the comic hard to read

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An interesting book about climate change and the things that effect it and what might be done to help with it. There were some neat facts in here, but sometimes the pages felt really chaotic and this made it hard to follow at points.

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I get that it's important subject matter but it's tedious reading essentially an illustrated lecture that gets tiresome when the non-scientist keeps trying to be funny/act the clown the entire time. It would've been better if it was more straightforward. That said, it's still not subject matter that's likely to grab many, and it didn't do much for me, despite the decent art.

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