This novel is described by some as “immersive.” No argument there. But this book is likely going to appeal to a reader of a certain age, (I mean older) and certainly one who reads a lot. The plot centers around Tom and Rose, two academics in what is left of the UK, in 2119. Tom especially is obsessed with finding a 2014 poem by Francis Blundy who was a renowned poet in his time. This particular poem A Corona to Vivian, his wife, was rumored to be a masterpiece, maybe the poet’s opus magnum, read aloud to Vivian at her birthday dinner with guests from throughout the plot. A corona is a long sonnet with prescribed form.
The poem is the stuff of legend and more so because no one has been able to find it. There are stories from 2014-2020 and volumes of information from numerous emails, journals and articles by a variety of people in the poet’s time; praise and awe abound. And while society has gone through a limited nuclear war (the Derangement) and lands have been permanently flooded from global warming (the Inundation), Tom and Rose pursue the poem and research it copiously. They get close and are ultimately surprised, and you’ll need to read the book yourself to learn more.
Part 2 of the novel is essentially a long set of entries in continuous narrative form from Vivian’s journals (2014-2020) all of which Tom has discovered. They include her insights to the poem, with some surprises for the researchers 100 years after she wrote. It’s a journal so we have details of supper and quality of sleep along with more intriguing information about trysts, adultery, likes and dislikes, ingenuousness, and worse, both open and hidden, and since she is an academic in the prior century, and her poet husband is also given to the academic world, we have an entire novel made up of literary academics and artists, both in 2014 and 2119. This may be read as – beware, there are boring parts. Even what amounts to a guilty plea by the educated as serially sexually naughty, they see it as just another thing one does as if ‘well of course there’ll be sex, we’re mature, educated adults.’ Oh there is love and war, satisfaction and longing among them, but overall sex comes off as necessary and maybe in some cases perfunctory.
All this makes for a novel that mature readers might find interesting. There is drama, there is a rising arc, especially in part 1. Part 2 has some of those elements but remains fairly flat both in tone and tenor until the great, final reveal – yes, about the poem. Yet the obsession with a 100-year-old missing poem feels like a stretch, even to me who is certainly of that certain age. So apparently I am not sufficiently academic. And there’s a sense of self-importance by the characters – a ‘look at us, aren’t we something’ feeling, at least in my reading. Structurally part 1 is fairly traditional novel form but part 2, Vivian’s writings discovered, are a unique thing in many ways, but with language that at times becomes pedestrian. Finally, given the topic and characters, McEwan may be channeling some of his own life in some of the events, but then, don’t all writers do that to an extent?
My final word is to recommend the novel, but temper expectations (or declare me wrong) given what I’ve said.
Write&Read 
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