The Poppy Fields is a mesmerizing work of speculative fiction by Nikki Erlick. Researcher and overachieving do-gooder Ellis Jones has developed a controversial cure for grief that requires patients to go into an extended sleep at a facility called the Poppy Fields. Erlick explores what lies at the heart of love and what it means to grieve.
Three strangers--Sasha, Ava, and Ray--are brought together during a tornado warning at a Kansas airport. After their flight is canceled, they split a rental car to embark on a drive to California, each seeking the Poppy Fields for their own reasons. They deal with the wounds of their past and attempt to move into new phases of their lives.
As she did in her debut, The Measure, Erlick here poses a fascinating what-if that powers the narrative and uses it to reveal the complexities of the human condition. While love is a central theme, each character has individual views on what a person should live for--views that will be challenged throughout the narrative. Readers will find deep satisfaction in this tender, thoughtful philosophical journey with equally thoughtful characters.
This is a crying-in-public kind of novel, with beautifully rendered emotional landscapes. Even its short vignettes about those who've visited the Poppy Fields contain moving descriptions, such as how a grieving parent recalls "the baby who'd grown inside of her, the boy with her nose and his ears, the reason for all their saving and working, the capsule for all their dreams." Nikki Erlick is on a streak, writing moving and captivating speculative reads. --Carol Caley, writer