Unnatural Disasters

November 15, 2018
A story that feels ripped from the pages of a catastrophic future.Living in a world of climate change and escalating international tension, high school horror-flick aficionado Lucy plays the typical teenager by going to prom with her boyfriend. Why plan for a future when the world is so in flux? The two lovebirds decide to travel the world post-graduation rather than following their peers to college. But prom night offers more excitement than anyone expected, and when tragedy strikes in Washington, D.C., the students retreat to their homes and families. With lines of communication interrupted, Lucy's household lives in a state of uncertainty. The fascinating tale of Lucy's absentee mother, a jailed political activist, is introduced as Lucy digs through boxes in the attic, but the story focuses on Lucy's attempt to rejuvenate her love life and live an everyday existence. Horrifying for the way it makes readers imagine existential dread in a time of chaos, the novel ends by introducing a new disaster. A final shift toward hope results from the characters' being forced to take community action. Most of the cast is assumed white, and there is some diversity in secondary characters, such as Lucy's Greek/Egyptian friend and his family.A brilliantly written tale of a town in crisis; while possibly too quiet and quotidian to move some, there is terror in picturing a mundane life in the midst of an apocalypse. (Fiction. 12-18)

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December 1, 2018

Gr 8 Up{amp}mdash;Lucy lived for the thrill of watching horror movies; little did she know she would soon have to live through one. While enduring normal teenage rites of passage, such as prom, Lucy sees the world (in 2049) change literally with one text on her phone. What ensues is a tale of love, loss, anger, despair and utter confusion. Lucy maintains her self-assurance and identity through obstacles of epic proportions. Hirsch portrays his characters in vivid reality, where readers can feel each emotion the characters possess. Teenage angst is nothing in comparison to being a part of the end of the world. The instabilities in the government and countries of the world lead to a teenage girl quickly having to become an adult. Young adult readers will be kept in suspense throughout as questions, mysteries, and revelations are slowly divulged even up to the last page. VERDICT Purchase where Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer is popular.{amp}mdash;Megan Honeycutt, University of West Georgia

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2018
Grades 8-12 It's 2049. Climate change has devastated swaths of the planet, acts of terrorism are all too frequent, and fundamentalist regimes are sweeping the globe. In the midst of this, Lucy and Luke are heading to prom and then, they hope, off on a grand postgraduation adventure. As prom nears its end, though, phones begin to go off around the gymnasium: Washington, D.C., has been the target of a massive explosion, killing more than 20,000 people, including most senior government officials. To make matters worse for Lucy, Luke's family is leaving to move to Brazil with an extremist religious group. In the aftermath of the devastating attack on Washington and her boyfriend's desertion, Lucy tries her best to deal with her own brokenness and family drama. While the setup is very much in line with dystopian sf, Hirsch (The Eleventh Plague, 2011; The Darkest Path?, 2013) focuses on characters and relationships in this novel, rather than action. A solid exploration of at least one possible future for our world.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2019
Hirsch explores what happens to ordinary people at the end of the world. After a national crisis strikes on prom night, Lucy and her friends attempt to navigate horrifying new realities and dim future prospects while still engaging in ordinary teen rites of passage. Readers will enjoy seeing a range of responses to impending doom in Hirsch's compelling narrative, marred only by a somewhat hurried ending.

(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)