The End as I Know It
A Novel of Millennial Anxiety
By Kevin Shay
Anchor
March 18, 2008
$15.95
It’s 1998. Or, as Randall Knight sees it, Y2K minus two. Randall, a twenty-five-year-old children’s singer and puppeteer, has discovered the clock is ticking toward a worldwide technological cataclysm. But he may still be able to save his loved ones—if he can convince them to prepare for the looming catastrophe. That’s why he’s quit his job, moved into his car, and set out to sound the alarm.
The End as I Know It follows Randall on his coast-to-coast Cassandra tour. His itinerary includes the elementary schools that have booked him as a guest performer and the friends and relatives he must awaken to the crisis. When nobody will heed his warning, Randall spirals into despair and self-destruction as he races from one futile visit to the next. At the end of his rope, he lands with a family of newly minted survivalists in rural Texas. There, he meets a woman who might help him transcend his millennial fears and build a new life out of the shards of his old one.
The paperback edition of the book can be purchased from Amazon.com and elsewhere.
You can read an excerpt from the beginning of the novel and a Q&A with author Kevin Shay.
You can also peruse what the reviewers have to say, and take a look at some praise from other authors.
The End as I Know It also has a section on Anchor’s site, and Kevin Shay can be found on Facebook.
For a daily glimpse into the feverish online speculation about the Y2K bug during 1998 through 2000, check out On This Day Pre-Y2K.