Community in the Face of the End of the World

Carly Butler has survived the Apocalypse. Multiple apocalypses, in fact. 

Obviously, the world never ended in the year 2000, or – spoiler alert – in 2008 or 2012. But as Butler explains in her memoir, Apocalypse Child, growing up in the wilderness of British Columbia awaiting the end of time can be an apocalypse of its own. 

In 1998, Carly Butler and her mother, DJ, moved from Montana to start a new life just outside of Smithers, BC. The idyllic woodlands were filled with dread as DJ drilled Y2K conspiracies and Evangelical Christian doctrine into a young Butler. She spent much of her teenage years hating herself for her queerness, praying to God for repentance, and waiting for an end that never came.  

Apocalypse Child spans Butler’s life up to the present day, detailing her struggle for permanent residency, her reckoning with her identity and sexuality, and her fight for her son’s life. Each of these crises would bring her back to the dread and isolation of that Smithers cabin. 

Readers will find a survival guide for the end of time within the memoir’s pages – one that trades stockpiling nonperishables for cultivating community. 

Butler offers up community as the key to surviving life’s everyday apocalypses. She found her way out of the Canadian wilderness and into her identity through help from her friends and family. Whether they offered something as little as a job referral or as large as an anonymous donation to pay off her school fees, Butler’s support system was her saving grace.  

It may also be our saving grace. The memoir holds a grim mirror up to North America’s sociopolitical landscape in a post-pandemic world. An apocalypse in its own right, the COVID-19 pandemic saw the rise of Christian nationalism and the acceleration of the alt-right media pipeline. The current political landscape makes for more than just tense Thanksgiving dinner conversation. Similar to how Y2K conspiracies led DJ Butler to seclude herself and her daughter in the Canadian wilderness, modern sentiments of distrust for government entities and institutions are sowing division among families across Canada. Those who don’t join the Freedom Convoy are left to reap the rewards of isolation from people they care about.  

Readers who find themselves navigating tense relationships with radicalized loved ones will see themselves in Butler’s story. The breakdown of these connections can feel like an apocalypse, and Butler’s nuanced approach to her relationship with her mother can serve as a healing guide for readers.  

More than anything, Butler doesn’t condemn her mother, instead thanking her and her father “despite their missteps.” In an interview with The Tyee, Butler says she doesn’t see her mother as “the bad guy”; she just needed to understand why her mother believed the things she did. It’s this understanding that helped Bulter mend her relationships with her parents. Similarly, understanding why fear drives people down radical pipelines or into the BC wilderness is the first step to bridging the gap to our estranged community members.  

While Apocalypse Child is billed as a memoir, it is also a story about relationships and the care that it takes to navigate the end of the world.