56 pages • 1 hour read
The Last Murder at the End of the World
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Character Analysis
Emory
Emory is the protagonist of the novel. Emory is inquisitive and loves to solve puzzles, and these traits place her in the detective role for the novel’s mystery plot. As a simulacrum, she is smaller than the average human and has long, dark hair. Emory moves from occupation to occupation to try to be of service to the community, but she cannot find anything that she feels meets her skill set. Emory’s questioning nature makes the other villagers uncomfortable because they interpret it as a sign of disrespect for the elders.
Emory’s character arc exemplifies the theme of The Ethics of Scientific Inquiry. Emory was one of Thea’s apprentices along with her husband, Jack, before he died, and she is the only villager who chose to quit the job. Emory quits her position because she does not want to follow the elders without questioning their ethics. This causes a rift between Emory and her family, as they fail to understand why Emory does not want to follow orders. Niema’s murder prompts Emory to investigate the elders’ scientific goals and methods even further. Her discovery that she is a simulacrum, and therefore designed by Niema, shifts her entire perspective on life and causes her to question her value.
As Emory wrestles with the fact that she is not human, she must continually fight for her self-worth against Thea and Hephaestus’s discrimination. Even though Thea knows that Emory is talented at detective work, she mocks Emory’s conclusions, as she attempts to push the blame away from herself. Similarly, Hephaestus repeatedly calls Emory a “crum,” short for “simulacrum,” which further devalues her. At first, Emory does not fight back against this discrimination because she accepts her inferiority. Eventually, Emory realizes that her intuition to question the elders even before she knew about her origin was correct because they do nothing but lie about their involvement in the murder. Emory learns about her own self-worth when she stands up for herself and tells Thea that she is a villager and, “after everything [she’s] seen from [Thea], [she’s] proud of that” (299). Emory realizes that the fact that she is not human may be beneficial to her because Niema has programmed her with a stronger sense of morality. Rather than shift blame like the elders, Emory’s goal is to solve Niema’s murder to protect her family and the village from destruction.
Seth
Seth is Emory’s father and acts as a foil for Emory. Seth is loyal and hardworking and acts as a bridge between the villagers and the elders. He is a sailor and spends his time working on the boats for the island, as well as rowing Niema to the lighthouse when she wants to conduct her experiments. Seth’s wife, Judith, died when she and Seth worked as apprentices for Thea, and Seth spends most of his life afterward grieving for her, especially since Emory reminds him of Judith.
Seth occupies a unique position in the village because he is the only person on the island besides the elders who have ever left it. He has a special connection to the elders that the other simulacrums do not: As Niema’s best friend, he trusts her and the other elders with his life. Seth’s worldview comes crashing down after Niema’s death because he realizes that everything that he has built his life on has been a lie. For most of the novel, Seth refuses to accept the truth about the elders, even with the evidence that Emory presents to him because it is too hard for him to change his perspective.
Seth is a foil for Emory because his strong faith in the elders contrasts with her skepticism. Seth takes pride in being of service to the elders and to the other villagers, and he interprets Emory’s inability to find her place in the village as disgraceful. Seth believes in honoring the elders above all else because “the elders are [their] last link to the old world” (25). This perspective contrasts with Emory’s belief that finding truth is more important than unquestioning trust.
Seth’s character arc epitomizes the theme of The Nature of Sacrifice. Emory believes that if the elders expect the villagers to sacrifice themselves at any given moment, then the elders should be willing to sacrifice themselves as well. Seth finds Emory’s belief system upsetting, and he does not feel shocked even when he learns that he is not human because his purpose in life has not shifted. Seth finally shifts his perspective when he hears Thea call the villagers “disposable” and learns that Niema’s memory wipe killed Judith. These instances finally snap Seth into reality because he realizes that the elders do not reciprocate Seth’s commitment. Although Niema started to feel guilty about Judith at the end of her life and even attempted to apologize to Seth, he realizes that Emory is right about the elders and that they will do anything to preserve themselves, even murder the villagers.
Thea
Thea is one of the elders on the island and one of the primary murder suspects. Thea is manipulative and arrogant. She wants to solve the problem of the fog so that she can wake up her sister, Ellie, from the statis pod and leave the island. Unlike Niema, Thea has no emotional connection to the villagers and believes that they are a means to an end, rather than individuals. Thea longs to reenter Blackheath so that she can check on Ellie and continue her experiments. When Thea learns that Niema and Hephaestus have lied to her about Blackheath, she feels betrayed and wonders if her sense of betrayal could have been enough of a motive to murder Niema.
Thea focuses on individualism rather than the community, highlighting the theme of Individual Versus Collective Good. Although Thea does care for Hephaestus, especially because he rescued Ellie and brought Ellie to the island, her focus is on self-preservation. She wants to eradicate the fog for personal reasons, rather than for the collective good. Thea views the villagers as tools, which is why she instructs Emory to solve Niema’s murder and report back to her. However, when the evidence points to her as the culprit, Thea begins destroying evidence, which points to how corrupt her morality has become. Abi reminds Emory to be kind to Thea and Hephaestus because of the trauma they experienced during the apocalypse, but Emory has trouble understanding their perspective. Thea refuses to take any criticism from Emory; even when the evidence points to her, she reminds Emory that she is above scrutiny as an elder. This open display of superiority causes Seth to change his mind about the elders because he realizes that they do not think they are capable of committing a crime. Emory finally tempers Thea’s arrogance by confronting her with the fact that only the elders have done anything wrong during the investigation. Although Thea never truly humbles herself, she asks Emory for the key to Blackheath so that she can escape inside. Thea dies when the fog catches up with her before she can reach Blackheath. Despite her arrogance and criticism, the villagers who are with her try to cover her with their own bodies to protect her. Even though this does not work, the act symbolizes the difference between human individualism and the villagers’ goal of protecting the community.
Niema
Niema is the head elder on the island and victim whose murder becomes the impetus for the novel’s mystery plot. She acts as a mentor for the villagers because she is the only elder who spends time with them. Before the apocalypse, Niema was the head scientist at Blackheath Institute, where she created Abi and the simulacrums. At Blackheath, Niema became a billionaire and bought the Greek island where the survivors now live. Before the novel’s events, her goal was to cure humanity of its violence tendencies to prevent another apocalypse. Although Niema manipulates both her colleagues and the villagers, before her death, she realizes that she will not be able to help humanity with her experiments and must trust the simulacrums instead.
Niema’s focus is maintaining power and control in her experiments and in the village. Only she knows that the simulacrums are immune to the insects inside the fog, making the dead man’s switch a red herring. As she continually fails at her experiments, she finally realizes that she must tell the simulacrums the truth about their origin. Niema’s decision to leave the island to the villagers because she believes that humans are beyond hope enrages Hephaestus and causes him to stab her and Hui. Rather than allow Hephaestus to kill the villagers, Niema wipes everyone’s memory and kills herself with the memory extractor as a final sacrifice for the island.
Although Niema’s secrets cause harm, her decision to sacrifice her life for the good of the island shows her change in character and underlines the novel’s theme of The Nature of Sacrifice. While Niema is a morally gray character, her final moments show that she learned the importance of sacrifice from the villagers and that she wanted to ensure that they have every opportunity to rebuild society. Abi acts as an extension of Niema’s will after she dies because she knows Niema’s intentions better than anyone on the island. Niema is not strong enough to destroy her creation on her own, so Abi takes matters into her own hands and controls Jack and the other apprentices so they will eventually kill her. Despite Niema’s past and her morally ambiguous decisions, she does her best to set the villagers up for success so that life can continue after the fog dissipates.
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