Absence

by Andrew Dana Hudson

In this gripping, moving, and genre-blending speculative debut, the world is unraveling from an epidemic of human vanishing. Two rookie agents from the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs are dispatched to small-town Kansas to investigate a woman who claims to have returned from Spontaneous Human Absence, offering answers that could change everything.

People are “popping”—disappearing, one by one, into thin air: an ongoing global cataclysm known as Spontaneous Human Absence. In a world where prospects for survival are increasingly grim, hopelessness prevails, political rifts widen, and doomsday predictions flourish.

Harvey Ellis works the night shift for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, an ad hoc federal agency meant to contain and catalog the crisis. Harvey’s job: to investigate claims of Absence, and, if validated, issue a standard government stipend to boost morale. Still recovering from losses of his own, Harvey is content in his routine—until his life is shaken by an unexpected assignment from the central office.

A woman long thought Absent has reappeared in her hometown of Dawnville, Kansas, claiming she’s been to the other side and back. But is her wild and irresistible account true, or is she just the latest false prophet, offering hope to a world desperate for it? Together with his no-BS partner, Shonda Erins, Harvey travels to Dawnville to find out.

A resonant portrait of a world beset by confusion and dismay, Andrew Dana Hudson’s debut is a vividly imagined novel of cosmic proportions, examining life in a time of exception and the stories we tell to get by.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Mystery, Dystopia, Audiobook, Speculative Fiction, Literary Fiction

448 pages, Hardcover

First published May 5, 2026

Reviews

[Tyffani · Rating 5 out of 5]

I adore speculative fiction and this book truly delivers!! In this world, people randomly disappear, literally popping out of existence. We follow Harvey, a federal agent with the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs. He gets a special assignment to investigate a person claiming to have returned after popping. While investigating the claim, Harvey has to contemplate his own beliefs about popping and the afterlife.

The world building in this book is superb. You’d think a book set in Kansas really wouldn’t need a lot of world building but you’d be wrong. Hudson sets up a Kansas that is straining under division and desperation and hope. You feel what the characters are feeling and you can understand their emotions.

The story does kind of drag around the 60% mark. It is still good and I was engaged but it felt long then. It eventually picked back up and the ending was fantastic. If you enjoy speculative fiction, you need to pick up this book!!

Thank you to Soho Press for the ARC of this novel!!

[ObscureVi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!

Absence made me feel pretty... conflicted. I was in a small reading slump for the last two, maybe three weeks, constantly jumping between books, reading few pages a day and then just putting them down, despite really wanting to read (thanks, brain).

I couldn't sleep, so I made myself some tea, grabbed my phone and opened Absence and to my surprise, the reading slump that clung to me till now simply... poofed (was it a pun? maybe). The first... probably one-third of the book? I totally lost track of the time and before I knew it, I was deep into the story.

The premise had me hooked from the start. I mean, the idea of people disappearing into thin air and no one really knows why? Not to mention, that it's happening all over the world and you can be gone in the blink of an eye, right in front of other people? Obviously, it's going to cause panic, the constant fear, that it can happen to you or your loved ones... and what exactly happens once you're one of the victims of Spontaneous Human Absence? Some will use it as an excuse to escape, vanish and hope no one will be looking for them, others can use the epidemic to cover-up their crimes.

All of the above were my thoughts before and during reading, at least until somewhere around halfway, when the book slowly started to lose me, despite how much I was enjoying it at first. I'm not even fully sure, what caused it: the amount of informations that it started to throw at us at some point? one of the parts that didn't really feel like they add much into the story, beside being a filler? or maybe it was the fact, that I expected a bit more of sci-fi things from a novel labeled as sci-fi?

Probably, it was a bit of all three and I won't be able to point at the main culprit. I'm just sure, that I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would, when I was at the beginning of the book.

[The Hateful Reader · Rating 1 out of 5]

By page 50 I was rooting for the epidemic.

Absence promises speculative fiction, dystopian mystery, sci-fi and delivers the thrill and appeal of a dictionary. People are disappearing worldwide and I have never been less interested in a global crisis.

The characters are so surface-level I couldn’t care less if they “popped” or stayed or murdered their grandma. The writing is flat and informational. The plot is one decent idea dragged behind a parade of unnecessary words.

448 pages… that’s how long it takes this book to say almost nothing. Absolutely brutal to get through. I’m truly stunned to see I’m the first 1 star. I feel like everyone else got the Absence deluxe edition and I got the instruction manual.

Grateful to NetGalley for the ARC and for their ongoing courage in letting The Hateful Reader judge things. Thank you to NetGalley and RB Media for giving me an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Pub date: May 5, 2026

[domsbookden]

DNF 30%

I wanted the story to focus more on the people disappearing and less on the sexcapades and woes of a mediocre white man.

[Renee Godding · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actual Rating: 3.5/5 stars, rounded up

Equal parts police procedural, sci-fi mystery and societal dystopia; there were plenty of colors in the palette that Andrew Dana Hugh could’ve chosen to paint the story of Absence with. Instead of choosing however, he blends these genres together in a way that worked surprisingly well for me. The mix is a little reminiscent of Jeff Vandermeer or Blake Crouch, but less bleak and alien than the former, and slower paced than the latter. Overall though, this was a unique new voice in the genre, that I’m sure many readers will enjoy.

The Story:
In a world close to our own, the population has been wrecked by an epidemic of spontaneous human vanishing. Without rhyme or reason, and from one second to the next, a person can “pop out of existence”, in a phenomenon known as “Spontaneous Human Absence”.
Agent Harvey Ellis works for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs – an ad hoc federal department tasked with investigating claims of Absence on their legitimacy, and discern any pattern if possible. Desensitized to the unrelenting random tragedies and reeling from a loss of his own, Harvey merely goes through the routine motions at his job. That is, until something unprecedented happens: a woman long thought Absent has reappeared in her hometown of Dawnville, Kansas, claiming she’s been to the other side and back. But is her wild and irresistible account true, or is she just the latest false prophet, offering hope to a world desperate for it? Together with his partner, Shonda Erins (the Scully to his Mulder), Harvey travels to Dawnville to find out.

What I loved:
Andrew Dana Hugh does a phenomenal job of setting the stage and hooking you into the layered mystery at hand. For about the first 1/3 of the book, I was reading compulsively, desperate to scrape together more clues to satisfy my curiosity.
The characters, although a bit stereotypical and lacking depth, bounce well of each-other, and I enjoyed Shonda and Harvey’s sceptic-believer-dynamic throughout. Harvey’s personal loss of his fiancée to Absence gives him a little extra layer of motivation to get to the bottom of this mystery.
The writing was smooth and accessible and I flew through the pages. That being said, interspliced with the action of the investigation, the author did take the time to step back once in a while and ponder the societal and existential implications of an epidemic like this (and the claim that there might be a way back for those departed!).
Unfortunately, the book wasn’t able to keep up this strong a momentum until the very end. Although there was no point where I stopped enjoying myself completely, I did feel like the book began to sizzled out like a dying flame from the 60% mark on.

What I didn’t love:
With its 450-page length, this is quite a hefty tome within its genre, and I have to say that I don’t think it does the work to justify that length. This is the classic example of “middle-book-sag”, where the second act drags out far too long and repeats steps it’s already played out. One too many red herring in the investigation, one too many conflict between partners… This could’ve easily been edited down by 50-100 pages, without losing any substance, and would’ve been better for it.
I was also left a little unsatisfied with the ending. Without spoiling plot points, I can only say that the novel is more interested in posing questions than actually answering them. This works fine for me in a more metaphorical/philosophical sci-fi mystery, but less so in a police-procedural. As the novel attempts to do both, I felt a little dissonance there.
Finally, there’s a particular story-line Harvey’s grief and questions about the Absence of his wife that’s far more prominent at the start and almost seems forgotten by the end. Given the emotional charge of this storyline, I couldn’t quite suspend my disbelieve over that.

Notes on the audio:
The audiobook was excellent in both overall quality and narration. The novel is single-POV, and the voice actor embodies the essence of the character and the story well. I can absolutely recommend this format, if it’s something you’re interested in.

Many thanks to Soho Press and RB-Media for providing me with an (audio-)ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

[Julia Cramer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and Soho Press for the Advanced copy of this novel!
I've always been drawn to speculative fiction right off the bat I was engaged with the premise of this book! I especially enjoy the type of speculative fiction that feels just a little too close to reality so this novel really hit all the marks for me. The premise being a simple but deeply unsettling thing such as a quick "pop" and you're out of existence without warning or trace is phenomenal. No explanation, no evidence that you were ever there- just gone *poof*. We follow Harvey Ellis, a federal agent working for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, who is then tasked with the investigation of a rare and very controversial case. A girl who claims to have returned after disappearing. From there the novel is less about solving the mystery and more about sitting with impossible questions. What I loved most about this novel was the world building, which is a funny thing to say seeing as this narrative is mainly set in rural Kansas, and anyone who is familiar with rural Kansas knows how fucking boring it is so the fact that this book was still able to have such insane world building in a seemingly very bland setting is absolutely mind boggling to me! I loved how the subtlety of the world building added to this stories emotional depth and just enhanced the believability of this fictional phenomenon even more. That being said, I did find it slowing down a bit around the 60-70% mark (as I was listening to the audiobook and found myself putting it down more often around this time) but the tone is consistent throughout which kept me coming back! I also found the lack of mention of Harvey's fiancée who went missing or "popped" towards the end of the novel to be a bit jarring because she was so heavily mentioned and talked about throughout just right up until the end. Overall though I really enjoyed this read! Just the right amount of speculative fiction mixed with thought-provoking ideas as well as being surprisingly emotionally resonant at times with it's themes of loss and fear, and of course the inherent human need for answers in a world that rarely provides them. If you're like me at all and enjoy speculative fiction, sci-fi, the netflix show "The OA", true crime, or even just a good riddle. Then this is the book for you! (Just don't get upset at me when you're left with more questions than answers).

[annie · Rating 3 out of 5]

As interesting as the premise is, I was a little disappointed by Absence. The story centers around the phenomena of “popping”, in which people around the world simply disappear from thin air. As great as it is that we get plenty of insight into how this gradual depopulation affects culture, society and government, it sometimes drags on for a little too long and teeters into infodumping. Between this and the long stretch in the middle where not a lot happens to move the plot along, I think it would have benefited from being trimmed down about 50-100 pages. At the same time, I enjoyed most of the speculative elements and found it pretty thought provoking by the end.

Thanks to Netgalley and SoHo press for the e-arc in exchange for an honest review!

[Katrina · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a huge fan of speculative fiction and Absence delivers. I loved the premise of this book. What happens when people spontaneously start popping out of existence? It was so fun to think about the trajectory that the world’s population might take under these circumstances. Some of the response reminded me of the world’s response to COVID.

I liked the mystery and thought the plot was interesting and engaging. The pacing was steady. I listened to the audiobook and thought the narrator did a good job.

I really enjoyed the whole nomenclature for this world: depop, absentia, etc. I appreciated the ethnic diversity and representation in the book. There was even a throuple!

The ending wasn’t wrapped up in a pretty little bow but that is the way of speculative fiction and something I’ve come to expect from the genre.

Overall an interesting and fun story.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ALC!

[ROLLAND Florence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Imagine a world where people suddenly disappear, massively. They do not fade away - they pop, with a loud sound. And just like that, they are gone.

Our hero is an investigator working for the bureau of depopulation affairs. Imagine a police division, responsible for determining if a person has truly disappeared (an Absentia case), or if something else happened to them. They collect evidence, interview witnesses, fill in paperwork. They have to travel for work to the places where people disappear from, sometimes massively.

This is a slow burn, full of reflections about what makes life meaningful in a world where people can suddenly "pop". Charlatans and scientists alike try to find an explanation, a treatment, a pattern. Some people pretend to return, sometimes years after their disappearance. All the others become afraid of staying alone. Apps are used to let your loved ones know that you are still alive.

The writing style of the author is very poetic. I found it very relaxing, and also very sad. This novel was full of aphorisms about death, relationships, and what gives life meaning. How can anyone fall in love when the other person might disappear at any moment?

Thank you NetGalley and Soho Press for the ARC. Thank you Andrew Dana Hudson for writing it.

[Erin Crane]

DNF @ 13%.

The concept of this one is very reminiscent of The Leftovers but dragged out. Instead of one big disappearance, you get an increasing amount of disappearances over months (years?) that has no end in sight. I liked the exploration at the start of the story of what that would mean in terms of the responses to the situation from the government and the public. How this ongoing crisis impacts people's behaviors or not.

This story is from the POV of a detective of sorts who investigates "pop" claims to ensure they are legitimate and not, you know, murder or something like that. Then a case comes along of someone "returning" from being popped 10 years later, and I assume the plot takes off.

For me the fact that this was written by a man was showing, and I didn't like it. But it was a subtle thing here where he thinks he's writing a strong woman. The stereotype of a woman like Shonda would be that she gets emotionally entangled with the narrator and wants him more than he wants her or something like that. I didn't finish the book, so perhaps it eventually plays out that way. Initially, she's written as very independent, such that she will cheat on her husband in an emotionally detached way. I'm not sure what her husband does or doesn't know. My problem with it is that it feels like the author wrote it thinking he was writing an empowered woman when really she's just the dream scenario for Harvey. She's only interested in sex? Sign him up.

There's also a popped wife that operates much like the dead wife trope of many a story focused on a sad man.

It was reminding me too much of Unfettered Journey by Gary Bengier and The Afterlife Project by Tim Weed, both of which had a similar problem for me.

On top of that, I didn't care for what the answer of this mystery was turning into. I prefer the non-answer of The Leftovers (in the show at least - haven't read the book). When you provides answers, it can quickly get into layers of SF nonsense that aren't as interesting as the impact of the mysterious thing. At least when it's a speculative lit fic situation like this.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

[Hope · Rating 2 out of 5]

Absence by Andrew Dana Hudson starts with an interesting premise. A world where people suddenly vanish without explanation should create enormous emotional and existential weight, and the idea of a government agency investigating those disappearances adds another layer of intrigue. The setup promises a thoughtful blend of speculative fiction, mystery, and social commentary.

The story clearly aims for something ambitious. It explores grief, uncertainty, political division, and the stories people create to survive during a crisis they cannot understand. There are moments where the atmosphere captures that quiet sense of dread well, especially in the way ordinary life continues despite the impossible happening around it.

Unfortunately, it never came together for me. The pacing feels extremely slow, and much of the book drifts between conversations, reflections, and ideas without building meaningful momentum. It often felt like the story kept circling its themes instead of developing them.

Harvey and Shonda work well enough as leads, but I never felt particularly connected to either of them. Their investigation should have carried tension and urgency, especially with the possibility that someone may have returned from Absence itself, yet the narrative rarely feels emotionally charged.

Hudson’s prose leans literary and introspective, which will probably appeal to some readers, but for me it added to the sense that the book was stretching relatively little material across too many pages. The ideas themselves are interesting, but the execution lacks focus and impact.

By the end, I felt like Absence spent a long time asking large philosophical questions without saying much that felt new or emotionally resonant. The premise deserved a sharper narrative and stronger payoff than it actually delivered.

Absence has an imaginative concept and thoughtful ambitions, but the reading experience felt slow, unfocused, and emotionally flat. I kept waiting for the story to fully connect its ideas into something meaningful, and it never quite got there for me.

[Geonn Cannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good worldbuilding, and an excellent X-Files-esque supernatural mystery.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found I could relate to this apocalyptic world where an unexplained phenomenon causes people to “pop” and disappear. The human reactions and drive to live life when faced with an unknown force taking lives felt very reminiscent of the early days of the Covid pandemic.

The book was well paced and had a satisfying ending. Would recommend.

[Duarte · Rating 5 out of 5]

[…] “That doesn’t make sense.”
“Nothing about Depop makes sense. All I’m saying is, consider the possibility that consciousness is a migratory phenomenon. And right now, like it or not, it’s leaving this world. Maybe it’s supposed to happen like this. When the world fills up, or when the seasons of the multiverse change, we scatter to the winds. Maybe it’s the only way intelligent life survives, because otherwise we kill whatever place we live in. I don’t know. But I do know this place is dying. It’s sick. It’s being abandoned, perhaps for good reason. Soon it will be empty, nothing but animals and plants and ruins and satellites in the sky broadcasting nothing.” 
[…]

[Hannah Durham · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great read to start the year!

I love a soft-sci fi story rooted in reality so this was an interesting premise to get stuck into. I enjoyed getting to know the characters and their world, whilst exploring the phenomenon of people disappearing into thin air.

A mysterious read that keeps you questioning the truth. Some elements felt a little farcical at points but never quite hit the ‘too much’ point.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading Absence and would recommend.

Thanks to Soho Press and NetGalley for the advance copy!

[TBS · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is kind of a mélange of the brisk police procedural tone of the X files with the interior literary sensibilities of Wolf Hall hung on a sweepingly poetic vision of societal collapse and the very deep cultural fears and misgivings about the afterlife. Huh? Yes, this is an ambitious and very unique novel. Harvey Ellis is an agent with the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, which investigates the terrifying epidemic of people randomly disappearing with a pop. They leave no trace, the vanishing events can occur with a single person winking out, or a group or in some instances on an even larger scale. A large faction of groups and cults, many of them religious, some violent, seek answers to the terrifying randomness of the culling and Harvey and his married partner Shonda, who have a complex relationship of their own, are assigned to a remote Kansas town to investigate the case of a woman who had popped and then returned, except no one has ever returned before. Harvey and Shonda find their belief systems (or lack thereof) challenged and sometimes shattered, as they try to piece together her story and follow the many leads she enigmatically provides for them or doesn’t. Harvey’s perspective dominates throughout; his narration grips by the throat.
I had no idea how this book would end, which is a big plus for me. The world building is singularly good, with the many details of how the country copes with a rapidly declining population (hint: self-driving trucks are ubiquitous, along with the buddy system used whenever possible). With so many avenues of philosophic exploration to the unspooling of a species, credulity is sometimes stretched and there are a few gaping holes, which on hindsight seemed intentional, but still were unsettling The resolution of the ending was difficult, though perhaps warranted. I’m still wrestling with it. Perhaps ultimately, this story could be viewed as an extended metaphor for all of our fears: the perilous uncertainties of life-sudden mortality, grief, breakdown of systems, the rise of extremism, and the severance of the bonds with loved ones. There is so much to consider in this beautifully written challenging book. My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of the book.

[Cindy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very interesting sci-fi novel about a future where people are disappearing - popping out or becoming absent/missing. The cause of “de-pop” is unknown but witnessed and apparently random. Harvey works for The Bureau and mostly verifies instances of popping out for the global registry, and so family members can receive their Congressionally mandated benefits. A lot of this is a thought experiment, meaning the author has thought through and shares his ideas for a future with declining populations, orphans, etc. there’s also a mystery at the heart of the story when one de-popped person appears to have returned, alive to tell about her experience. This is what speculative fiction should do, and it does it very well. 4.75 stars.
My thanks to the author, publisher, @RBMedia, and #NetGalley for early access to the audiobook of #Absence for review purposes. Publication date: 5 May 2026.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

My thanks to NetGalley and Soho Press for an advance copy of this novel that looks at a world that is slowing disappearing, person by person for reasons unknown, and what happens when when of these people, long thought disappeared returns with explanations, explanations that few believe, a story that seems nebulous, with answers that raise more questions than solutions.

Death is something that we all must face, no matter how hard we try not to. All the anti-aging, the drinking of a child's blood, biohacking imprinting one's brains onto the cloud, are just things we as humans have done for thousands of years. Praying, worshipping what ever cool thing is laying around, sacred rituals. All in an effort to hold off the inevitable. Which is why this book left so much of an impression on me. I am not afraid of dying, I am afraid of being left alone. Also death is a lot of paperwork in this society, and I would like to skip that. It is the fear of being alone though, of watching my family die that really makes me uncomfortable. At least I know what is happening. What would it be like if people just disappeared? A pop and one is gone. What happened? Where are they? Can they return? Are they happy? Questions asked in the novel, a book that was far more than I expected. Absence by Andrew Dana Hudson is a book about loss, fear, one comes next, and what happens when someone comes back, with more questions than answers.

Harvey Ellis is a member of the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, a government agency set up to deal with the sudden rise of people just popping out of existence. One minute there, the next gone. The world has come to pretty much a stand-still. People don't want to have children, for fear they might just disappear. Work places are a nightmare as workers just disappear, as are most forms of entertainment. Apps keep track of people, sharing the information with friends just in case one pops, at least someone might now. A popped person leaves no trace. Just a noise. And are never seen again, something which makes their disappearances even more painful. Ellis along with his partner, and maybe something more Shondra Erins are sent to Dawnville, Kansas to investigate a Return, someone claiming to have popped, but has come back. This happens a bit but most are proves to be liars, or lost people in other ways. Ellis suspects that this return, a young girl who disappeared in high school, but looks older and wiser, might be real. At the same time disappearances are starting to rise, with group pops on the rise, leading to a fear that things might be getting worse. However the more the Returned person shares, the more questions that arise, and the worse the world seems to get.

I did not expect to spend a day of two reading magazines of no importance, English issues of Prog to be precise, because my brain was too busy processing this book. Hudson has built a world that seems more than real. Something that could happen tomorrow. A world of disappearing people, checks given if the person is proved to have been popped, and no real answers for why things are happening, nor how to stop it. The mix of people believing in what is happening, blaming God, or the Government, seems so human. The way Ellis describes the way he lost people, and the feelings he had, the loss, the fear they weren't gone, the blaming others. Hudson does a very good job describing the world, the consequences, and the fears of those left behind. A check to appease people but no answers. A breakdown in morality as mortality seems closer and closer. And the fear. Always the fear.

The book is big with a lot of big ideas and a lot of big questions. A lot of this will stay with the reader, at least it did for me. A lot of fears, and a lot of well, sometimes humans can do interesting things, and keep going. I look forward to more books by Andrew Dana Hudson.

[J Davis Mallory · Rating 5 out of 5]

What happens if you can randomly disappear without a trace? That is the state the world is in, in the book Absence. People are popping, also known as Spontaneous Human Absence. The only thing you hear before a person disappears is a loud pop, and then they are gone. This has caused chaos, including cults, mass suicides, and an uptick in murders and kidnappings. However, one of the people who is trying to control the chaos is Harvey Ellis, who works night shift for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs. It is a government agency that investigates people who are believed to be Absence. If they are truly Absence, the Absence’s remainders get government stipends in an effort to boost morale in the country.

One day, Harvey is given an unexpected assignment: a claim of a Return. In Dawnville, Kansas, a woman who was thought to be Absent is claiming to have returned from the void. She is spreading the word that there is a life after popping. However, can Harvey truly trust the story the woman is spreading, or is she just another rising prophet looking for a flock? Harvey and his partner, Shonda, head to Dawnville to find out.

How would people randomly disappearing out of existence change society? It is an interesting concept that the novel explores. Being alone is considered a dangerous option. If you are alone and you pop, no one would know. There would be no way to tell if you disappeared of your own volition, kidnapped, or popped. It causes people instead to use monitoring systems on themselves so they can constantly update loved ones of their continued existence.

It was also interesting to see how technology changed during this. Transportation had to be automated, including planes, trains, buses, and cars, because if someone popped, there would be no one to control the vehicle. There are still transportation systems that could be run manually, but you couldn’t work it alone. You have to travel at least in pairs.

There is also the concept of a skeptic versus a believer. With people continuously disappearing at a rapid rate with no end in sight, people are looking for answers. In the book, Harvey came across a person who worshipped every known religion just in case one of them would prevent him from popping. In regard to the current case that Harvey is on, he constantly fights with Shonda over the woman who claims that she returned from the void. Harvey desperately wants to believe the woman because there is hope in her story that there is something beyond the popping. However, Shonda believes that the returned woman is pulling the wool over their eyes. The constant back and forth throughout the book illustrates the hope we put on people, especially when it is dealing with the unknown.

One of the things that I found fascinating in the book is how religion changed. People understand the concept of death, but how do you explain the concept of sudden disappearance? Do you treat it like a death or something unexplained? In the book, many different religions are explored. Some new religions are created to explain Absence. Cults had an uprising. Religions like the Catholic Church splinter off into smaller groups, not liking the original teachings. It is interesting to see people’s faith shaken and looking for answers anywhere they can get them. It is more about what makes a person feel safe versus what is right or wrong.

Overall, I really like the book. It makes you wonder how you feel safe in a world where you could randomly disappear without any warning, whether it's through community, religion, or technology. In the spirit of the book, I have the following question: How would you continue to live life with people randomly disappearing out of existence?

[Robert Goodman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Andrew Dana Hudson’s new novel Absence has a fairly depressing premise and try as he might (and he does not always try) it never really lets up. This is not a criticism for a book that deals directly with issues of grief, loss and belief but it is worth readers knowing before picking it up. Absence has been compared to Ben Winters’ The Last Policeman and it has a similar feel of its protagonists falling back on process to try and deal with existential dread. The setup also echoes, in other very specific ways, the TV series The Leftovers.

The world of Absence is one in which people have, for reasons no one understands, started to randomly ‘pop’ out of existence and never return. The process is called a ‘pop’ due to the noise that is the only indication that someone has gone. Harvey Ellis works for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, aka DePop, his job is to confirm that people have genuinely popped as the government pays compensation to survivors. Harvey is still scarred by the loss of his parents and fiancé in a ‘clusterpop’ where most of the congregants of a church disappeared at the same time.

The plot of Absence centres around an investigation that Harvey is sent on with partner Shonda to the small town of Dawnville Kansas where a woman called Gabriella claims to have returned from wherever it is the missing go. Ten years before, Dawnville had promoted itself as a “safe town” where popping would not happen, a reputation it lost with Gabriella’s disappearance. If this woman it telling the truth it could change the way people think about the whole process of ‘popping’ but there are significant ambiguities in her story. Harvey and Shonda often reference the X-File which is a solid call as Harvey desperately wants to believe while Shonda remains sceptical.

As noted, the world that Hudson has created is a fairly depressing one. People disappear randomly, and those left behind (the remainers) have to pick up the pieces but are also left to wonder when their turn will come. It is a world in gradual but unstoppable decline. As a result there is plenty of consideration of the nature of grief and how people respond to the loss of loved ones. Hudson makes the point a few times that these reactions are not limited to his world but are part of the world we live in now: people die from random accidents, or disappear for no discernible reason. But his scenario feels like an extreme way to contemplate these issues.

Absence feels a little long and there is a lot of setting up that needs to happen in the first third of the novel. But once the ground rules are set it kicks into gear and Hudson delivers some tense set action pieces and some great revelations. The best aspect of Absence is that Hudson holds back from giving any definitive answers. While this is set up as a procedural investigation, readers may not necessarily get the type of closure that they would normally expect (or need).

Absence is a book that starts dark and never quite reaches the light. But that is not necessarily Hudson’s intention. What he succeeds at is creating a plausible scenario and then exploring all of the ways that humans will respond. In doing so he is able to successfully explore the ways in which we deal with real life trauma but in a safely speculative sandpit.

[Lachlan Finlayson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was attracted to this book by the publishers description. The premise being, a world that is unravelling from an epidemic of human vanishing. Spontaneous. Suddenly not there. A bit like in The Time Travellers Wife, but in this book they remain clothed as they travel, somewhere... The disappearing phenomena is known broadly as Depopulation. And of course the Government is concerned.

The plot revolves around two employee of the Bureau of Depopulation who are sent to investigate a young woman who claims to have returned from a disappearance. This is rumoured to have happened but has never been verified. So far, so good. I enjoyed the opening chapters.

But they were not enough. I was some hours into the audiobook version and with several more hours to go, I decided not to continue. Besides the plot, there wasn’t enough incentive to continue. The investigators were stereotyped. A pair of cops. One feisty, with swagger, full of attitude and lots of clever, snappy dialogue. The other was quiet, thoughtful, diligent, conscientious. Good cop, bad cop when it came to interrogations. The plot was very slow to develop. Over a third of the way into the book, there was little to keep me listening. Someone had disappeared a decade ago and our investigators were slowly investigating whether this person really had returned. Or was it all fake ? Noting much had happen. Noting much was revealed. No doubt it will eventually.

I felt some interest in one of the investigators, the deep, thoughtful one. He had a history that resonated with the plot. Most of the other charactered were somewhat cliched. Shallow, underdeveloped. I had little interest in what became of them. There was a lot of dialogue. Over-scripted, back-and-forth banter between the investigators. Almost too much and it began to have a sense of a screenplay rather than a novel. A Fox Mulder and Dana Scully vibe.

The background and atmosphere was unusual given the not infrequent disappearances that kept happening. Apart from some public service advice (for example on driving alone or regularly checking in with family and friends), the government and authorities carried on, almost as normal. Annoyed by the situation; disappearing people were a nuisance to deal with. There seemed to be little widespread panic, anxiety or end-of-world behaviour. Some, but not what you might expect, given the circumstances.

The overall tone and atmosphere was almost film-noir. A somewhat dark plot, a couple of hard-working cops, unusual events to be explained, people to be questioned. A sci-fi element of course, but it was more in the background; at least in the first part of the book. Characters were slow to develop. Or remained shallow and one-dimensional. Unfortunately, not very compelling or interesting. In closing, this wasn’t what I was expecting, and about a third of the way through, it did not provide enough incentive to finish. Not a bad book, just not a book for me.

[Robyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading this book made me realize a couple of important things:

1. Great writing can keep you engaged in a story, especially in the messy middle.
2. My favorite genre is speculative fiction. Sci-fi and fantasy are great, but the philosophical touches that come with speculative fiction are uniquely engrossing.

With all of that said, this is a very interesting story. If you enjoy speculative fiction, you will enjoy this book. If you are looking for shades of fantasy, action, or sci-fi this may not be for you as this is not a speculative fiction that crosses into other genres.

I was immediately engaged in the main character, the setting, and the world-building. It had an interesting, if unusual mystery grounding the plot. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys the work of Jasper Fforde or Kazuo Ishiguro. The world building and specificity are like Fforde while the philosophical musings remind me of Ishiguro.

What I valued most was the writing. Not only is it written clearly, it is also written for adults. Over the past couple of years, I have struggled to get through many more recent Fantasy, SciFi, and Speculative fiction books because they do not read as though they are written much more conversationally and focused on serving a TikTok or Instagram audience rather than readers.

Sometimes I have a hard time finishing books where the writing feels undisciplined. That was not the case with Absence. While reading you could tell certain words were chosen with precision to convey information in a specific way. As a consequence, the prose was not only absorbing, but it extended the mystery at the heart of the story effectively.

While I truly enjoyed this book, it does not earn 5 stars for two very specific reasons. This is a story without humor. It is quite dark, and while I am sometimes in the mood for that, I do not think I was in the state of mind for such a heavy story. This was compounded by the book's length. While not long (around 450 pages) there are several points where the reader things the end is near, but the story continues. That is not a criticism, the overall story finishes strong, but it does meander in the middle.

While including more moments of levity would reduce the impact of the story, there are several editing choices that might have improved the pacing without sacrificing quality. That being said, I would highly recommend this book. It is excellent.

Thank you to NetGalley and Soho (quickly becoming a standout publisher of Speculative Fiction), for the ARC.

[Bookworm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: B+

Received from netgalley in exchange for a review.

Absence is a strange book. It could make a pretty compelling tv series or movie. Something you'd see on the sci-fi channel. The story follows two agents, Harvey, a young straight white guy, and Shonda, his black coworker with whom he has a sexual affair. The two are investigating the disappearance of Gabriela Reyes, a girl who vanished as a teenager due to a phenomena called Popping (where a person spontaneously disappears out of existence) and returns some years later claiming to have returned from another dimension.

As you can expect there's been some huge upheavals in society in general given the suddenness and unpredictable nature of popping. People now have to do everything in pairs in case they disappear and the government gives a payment to those related popped individuals to help them continue on with life. There's multiple parts of the spectrum: those who choose to ignore depop as they can't prevent it, those who see it as a revelatory sign and those who stop their lives to live in peace awaiting the pop.

One thing I found a bit strange about the world was that, for some reason, popping motivates the us government to build a functional rail system. Why? Now no one is going to really be using it so wheres the money in it? People still travel internationally, everyone is still living in a capitalist hell! Not even the end of the world can stop the machine from turning.

I found the book quite compelling when it came to the character discussions between Shonda and Harvey. Harvey is adrift in his life just working a job he doesn't care about given it's one of the easiest to get, dispassionate about life since his girlfriend popped. Shonda has a husband and child and so she feels more attached to living with purpose. O feel like Harvey could be any of us born too late to really flourish as easily as anyone else could've and the absence system is one that likely would be attractive to people who are just waiting to die or are one pay cheque away from homelessness.

I won't lie and say I'm not somewhat disappointed in the direction the story went but I didn't enjoy it as a mystery drama, less there being not so much science fiction to it.
The whole world has such a feel of there being a haze over the people living in it.

Worth reading if you like a slow paced mystery. Compelling characters.

[Michael Burnam-Fink · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absence combines near future cosmological mysteries with the psychology of living under the apocalypse. The problem people suddenly vanishing to parts unknown with no warning and no more sign than the gentle "pop" of air closing the void where they once world. Billions have vanished, and the threat of going at any moment has reshaped modern life.

Our protagonist, Harvey Ellis, is an agent with the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, a new government agency charged with managing the collapse. His mundane job is certifying that people are really gone so the survivors can collect the benefits, and sorting out proper pops from mundane murders and runaways. It's not an easy job, holding the state together against conspiracy theorists, cultists, and good old fashioned denial, but someone has to do it.

Harvey's routine is interrupted when a small town in Kansas reports a Return. No one has ever come back from popping, and more than a decade after vanishing from a high school bathroom, Gabriella Reyes could save the world, or finally destroying, depending on if she's telling the truth or what brand of lie she's telling.

Harvey and partner Shonda (another BPA agent who he's having an affair with. What are rules when the world is ending?) venture into the pressure cooker of a small town with a traumatic history to divine the truth. The mystery is X-Files flavored, but where Hudson excels is drawing out the little details of the world, like the apps people use to track that they're still present, or the return of Amtrak since suddenly driverless cars and pilotless planes are too dangerous for mundane travel.

The mood is perfect. Hudson is one of the leading figures in the genre of climate fiction, and in Absence the metaphor isn't particularly subtle, but he has enough respect for the reader not to make it didactic. There's nothing that the people of this world can do about depop except manage the consequences. The uncertainties are truly cosmological. Climate is a lot more mundane, even if coming to emotional grips with climate rather than mere weather is out there. But the worst part of my life, at least, is having to get up and go and grapple with spreadsheets rather than the next few decades, because the psychological weight is too high. Absence slides in under that door.

And it's a damn fine novel, one that I finished over a pleasant Saturday, which is something I haven't done in a while.

[O'Dell (Just Read it Already) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received an advance copy of this book courtesy of the publisher. All thoughts are my own.

The premise of this one caught my attention immediately. It's a very interesting read, I'm just sad I didn't love it as much as I wanted to.

In this world, people are randomly disappearing into thin air. It's happening all over the world, and no one knows why. They call it Spontaneous Human Absence, or "popping." One second someone is standing next to you, the next second they're gone. The world as we know it is falling apart. Political rifts are wider than ever, cults are out of control, the population is dwindling and everyone's waiting for their turn to pop.

Harvey Ellis works the night shift for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, a government agency created to track and manage the crisis. His job is pretty straightforward. Investigate claims of Absence, validate them if they're real, and issue a government stipend to the family to boost morale. He's still recovering from losses of his own, but he's settled into his routine and he's content with it.

But then he's sent to a small Kansas town where a woman who disappeared years ago has reappeared. She's claiming she popped as a teen and has been to the other side and back, and knows what happens when people pop. Is she telling the truth, or is she just another false prophet offering hope to a world desperate for it? Harvey and his no-nonsense partner Shonda head to Kansas to find out.

On the plus side, the premise of the book is fascinating, and the characters are all pretty interesting. I couldn't help but wonder how much, or if at all, my life choices would differ from now if I were living in this world. The idea of "popping" is fascinating and terrifying at the same time. You could be going about your day and just cease to exist. No warning. No explanation. And the idea of someone "popping back" to their reality brought the central mystery that drives the whole story. It was really interesting, and the world Hudson built was clear and well thought out.

My biggest problem was that it felt really long and, at times, like it was spinning its wheels. I found myself skimming because oftentimes it didn't feel like the plot was moving. That said, I liked that it never answered all the questions it asked but left things up to interpretation. Not everything gets explained or resolved. For a book about an incomprehensible global crisis, that makes sense.

Speculative fiction lovers will likely eat this one up. I just wish it had been edited down by about 50 pages for a tighter narrative.

[Jessica Woodbury · Rating 4 out of 5]

Right up there with any speculative novel of the last ten years. The concept may not sound so new, it may seem like other stories, but Hudson has created a vast world here digging into all kinds of details and unforeseen consequences. The breadth of this worldbuilding tells us a lot about the present moment as well as this strange near-future.

Hudson also has plenty to dive into and examine. It is, of course, a story about grief and our protagonist's journey through it. But it's also about death. Absence is, in many ways, just a magnified kind of death. Now it is more random, more unanticipated, more surprising. We always talk about death as something that could happen any time, but we don't really mean it. In this world, you do mean it. How does that change us? Who does it turn us into? And how does that intersect with so much loss?

Harvey and Shonda are really just bureaucrats, but the investigative nature of their work can make this feel almost like a procedural, it has the nice comforting beats of one. They are trying to solve a mystery, even though that mystery is possibly the biggest mystery that exists. We get the trope of the skeptic and the believer, but it never feels rote. Shonda protects herself, doesn't let everything in. And since we get to see the workings of Harvey's mind we know just how much he balances his own desire to believe with his own worries and doubts.

If this was 50-100 pages shorter it would be pretty perfect. It can get rambly. There are times when this works, when it helps you get grounded in this world. And most of the pacing is great, Hudson lets it stretch and stretch over days, letting things build and then calm and then build again. I'm not sure we need all the flashbacks, and the details of the many religious subtypes pulled me out of it. But despite all that I didn't feel like this was overly long, and I thought the final section was still interesting and had momentum.

A pretty fantastic debut. Excited to see what Hudson does next.

[Steve's Book Stuff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absence is an ambitious novel by Andrew Dana Hudson. The premise? People, sometimes by themselves, sometimes in “clusters”, simply disappear. One minute they are there, then, with a popping sound, they are gone. People pop. They are no longer there. No one can explain it. No one knows what happens to those who have popped, where they go, and whether they are living or dead. They just disappear.

This has been going on for several years now, and the world has found ways to cope with the anxiety and lack of knowing that this phenomenon has engendered. For one thing, the government has formed the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs to track the disappearances and to make sure that folks are not trying to commit fraud or murder under the guise of a false pop. It’s at the Bureau that our protagonist, Harvey Ellis, works as a kind of investigator.

One day his boss calls him in and asks him to take a trip to rural Kansas to investigate a woman who claims to have returned after having popped. So far, no one has ever been known to have returned. No one even knows if “returning” is possible.

What follows is a combination of a police procedural, a vision of societal breakdown, a meditation on religion and belief, and a rumination on our mortality and the fragility of life. It’s very well done, with each new scene and event building on the ones before in a slow but satisfying revelation. There is some repetitiveness, and the book went a bit too long to reach its clever conclusion. But those are quibbles that didn’t take away from my enjoyment of the book.

This is a science fiction story that is more fiction than science. For my tastes that would not normally be a positive statement. But in this case, it works beautifully. As I read, I started picturing its events as part of a TV miniseries, and my mind went to the adaptation of Emily St John Mandel’s Station Eleven. All of which is to say that I think Absence is a fine American novel. Read it for a window into a dystopian future, and a reflection back to our own lives.

[Joel · Rating 5 out of 5]

In "Absence", the world is experiencing a disastrous phenomenon as people randomly "Pop" out of existence. The population is dwindling, leaving the "remainders" to stagger forward without knowing what will happen to the world, or to them after they pop. To tackle this, the government has created a special agency called the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs to investigate each absence, though their job is not really to figure out what happened to them or what's causing the depopulation so much as to confirm each absence is truly due to a pop so the remainders can claim a benefits check. Harvey Ellis is one of these agents, dedicated to his job after his fiancée and parents popped a few years back, and he does his job well--until he gets a call to investigate a Return, someone claiming they popped years ago and found their way back to this world. Bringing along his coworker and lover, Shonda, they investigate the Return and uncover a bigger mystery dating back to the early days of Depop.

While Absence has some action moments, there is a lot of necessary world-building, which is truly one of its strengths. The author tries to think of every possible effect of rapid unpredictable depopulation, from people afraid to have children to reliance on automation/robots to resurgence of train travel. It feels realistic and fantastic at the same time. While the ending may be a bit unsatisfying to some, as there are still many questions about depopulation that remain unanswered, from a storytelling standpoint it's quite satisfying and the main primary plot points are nicely tied up. Harvey is a wonderfully complex character, an everyman who represents the frustration and struggles of the average person trying to make sense of disaster. The narrator, Dan John Miller, does a phenomenal job capturing the tone of the story and bringing the characters to life.

Big thank you to the author, Soho Press, and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book and provide an unbiased review.

[Joanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

A really cool concept, but an uneven execution. It's impossible for me to avoid comparison with The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta. There, a whole bunch of people disappear all at once with no explanation. In Absence, people keep disappearing ("popping") over a period of years--it just becomes a new normal thing that's happening on the regular.

Both books are interested in the effects on the folks who remain behind. Perrotta focuses on individual perspectives and mostly refuses to really wrestle with societal/governmental issues. Hudson takes almost the opposite approach and makes the main character a government agent in the "Bureau of Depopulation Affairs" and quite a bit of the book is spent discussing the checks that are given to family members of the popped.

Both books posit new religions (or cults) that spring up in response. Perrotta is much more interested in what these religions are really like. Hudson gives them short shrift--they're present on the periphery of the story and a few plot points, but we never learn what they really believe.

It seems we are at a modern point where lots of stories are asking questions about how to live in uncertain times. At its heart, this book is about how to move forward in a time when the future feels entirely uncertain--is it reasonable to go ahead and have a kid if you don't know whether you'll be around to parent the kid; is it a good idea to have a job if the world is rapidly changing; can technology solve for existential angst? Unfortunately, the book couldn't really decide what it wanted to say about these questions. The characters just be-bop along.

The narrator was good and gave the story a bit of emotion that the text lacked. I'd listen to something else with this narrator.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the audiobook ARC.

[Rustic Red Reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had mix feelings on this book, I think it delivered in the end and enjoyed the first part, but I sometimes have a hard time reading the middle that I almost DNF'd this one.

I'll just say this one since it would be mentioned a lot below, I feel there's too much world-building in this book. I was nearing the end and the author still manage to sprinkle some tidbits of information regarding the world. It feels like books you can read in video games, that's not necessary to understand the whole story, but to give more lore to the world your character is living in.

I'll list some of my problems

(a) Only one POV - I personally think this one hurt this book the most, since we are following one person throughout the whole book. There's a lot of world-building in this book - the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs and how it works, the religious groups that formed, the everyday life of people (through investigation). All of these are through his eyes only. I feel sometimes we are going out of the way or having "bumps" in the investigation to introduce a some a part of the world.

(b) Flashbacks and Bumps - I totally feel that it's a bit unnecessary. While it fleshing the character even more, I think I would like to learn about it in present day. I personally wanted to skip this parts, but I don't want to miss anything. There's another "bump" in the middle that are quite long, I feel its a bit unnecessary and just makes this novel way longer, but it sets up the climax and the conclusion of the novel.

(c) "Sci-Fi" - this was labelled as sci-fi, at the start I thought it is sci-fi since the explanation, or rather the analogy, around the disappearances are science-y. But aside from that it doesn't really feel like sci-fi.

Despite all of this, I think it's still an interesting read but I feel it could be shorter.