Notes from the Shelf

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59 Minutes by Holly Seddon
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 320
Rating:  ★★★★★
Buy: bookshop.org

This post contains spoilers.

Book Blurb

Nuclear missile threat to South England. 59 minutes until impact. Seek immediate shelter. This is not a test.

Carrie is a young mother desperate to reunite with her daughter. Frankie, newly pregnant, faces a romantic vacation that takes a terrifying turn. Then there’s the enigmatic older woman determined to protect her teenage daughter, Bunny, no matter what.

Across South England, these three women must navigate survival amidst chaos when the country receives a nuclear bomb alert. With only 59 minutes before mass destruction, will they make it to their loved ones in time?

My Thoughts

When I first picked up 59 Minutes by Holly Seddon, I wasn’t sure I was emotionally prepared for it. A novel centered on the threat of a nuclear strike on a major city feels uncomfortably plausible, especially in today’s political climate. The idea alone was enough to make me hesitate. And while that initial fear never fully went away, I ultimately found the book incredibly compelling, though I’ll say upfront, this is a heavy read and very much not for everyone. Content warnings absolutely apply, and some readers may find parts of this novel deeply triggering.

At its core, 59 Minutes is a story about what happens when society is told it has less than an hour left. As expected, disaster brings out both the best and the worst in people, and Seddon doesn’t shy away from either. The novel follows three women whose lives intersect over the course of the countdown, and I really appreciated how their stories were woven together. Their connections feel intentional rather than convenient, and there’s a twist in how they’re linked that I genuinely didn’t see coming, one that added a surprising layer to the narrative and made the structure of the book feel especially clever.

There were several moments where I had to step away from reading, not because the book dragged, but because it was emotionally overwhelming. Frankie’s kidnapping by a local militia was particularly harrowing, as was the scene involving the teenage girl traveling with Carrie who is dragged into an alley. These moments are brutal and heartbreaking, but they serve a purpose. Seddon isn’t writing for shock value alone, she’s forcing the reader to confront how quickly moral lines dissolve when fear takes over. At the same time, there are moments of resistance and humanity that remind you people won’t all go quietly, even when the odds are hopeless.

One of the most striking aspects of 59 Minutes is how visceral it feels. The descriptions are so vivid that I could clearly picture the chaos unfolding: gridlocked traffic, escalating desperation, violent crime, suicides, and senseless killings. Nothing about this book feels sanitized or distant. It genuinely feels like a realistic depiction of what would happen if a nuclear threat were announced today in a major city. That realism is what makes the book so unsettling, but also what makes it so effective.

The structure of the novel reinforces that tension beautifully. Chapters are organized around the remaining time before impact, and as the minutes tick down, the sense of dread becomes almost unbearable. The slow realization that the threat is real, and the rapid unraveling of societal norms that follows, feels painfully accurate. You can feel the collective panic building page by page.

Even when the truth is revealed—that the threat was the result of a hack rather than an actual incoming strike—it doesn’t undo the devastation that’s already occurred. That, to me, was one of the most powerful points of the book. The damage is still real. Lives are still lost. Trauma doesn’t magically disappear just because the bomb never fell. The aftermath, especially in the closing chapters, is deeply heartbreaking.

Final Thoughts

59 Minutes is an apocalyptic tale in every sense, filled with grit, fear, and human ugliness, but also resilience. It’s not an easy book to read, and it’s one I’d recommend with caution. But for readers who can handle intense subject matter and want a story that feels disturbingly possible, it’s absolutely worth the emotional investment.

If you’re interested in checking out ’59 Minutes’ by Holly Seddon, consider purchasing it through Bookshop.org. Supporting this link helps sustain independent bookstores and keeps this blog thriving.

Check out other thriller reviews:
Tilt by Emma Pattee
Bury Your Gays by Chick Tingle
Beautiful Ugly by Alice Feeney

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