With a bang? With a whimper? Or a plague or nuclear bomb? Or asteroid? What happens when the world begins to end, or a cataclysmic event changes our civilization so radically and so quickly that vast numbers of people cannot adapt? This week I’ll explore five books that envision such scenarios.
The first is a young adult novel by Susan Beth Pfeffer titled Life As We Knew It. Miranda is a sophomore in high school who keeps a diary about her friends, her divorced parents, her pregnant stepmother, her classes and assignments. She is aware that there is talk in the news about the possibility of an asteroid hitting the moon, knocking it out of its orbit. All of her teachers talk about it and it’s on CNN day and night, but she doesn’t quite grasp the significance. “I guess Ms. Hammish thinks this moon thing is historical, because in history that’s what we talked about,” she writes.
When the asteroid hits, it sends the moon closer to the earth. Cell phones and cable tv no longer work, and Miranda realizes that civilization may indeed be changing. The family learns from a network station that tsunamis have caused widespread destruction along the eastern seaboard, and hundreds of thousands of people have been killed.
Miranda’s diary entries from then on describe the changing, colder climate she and her family endure, the increasing gas prices, the scarcity of food, the lack of electricity and lack of heat as the world gets colder and colder. Sick neighbors die when they can’t get to doctors. There is looting and crime. Neighbors trudge through the snow to help each other. The library stays open as long as it can, but eventually it has to close.
Life As We Knew It had me thinking about the paltry supplies my husband and I keep in case of a hurricane or ice storm. They would last a week or two. We would need to learn new skills, as Miranda does, and adopt new ways of looking at the world, in order to survive. This is a great novel for anyone twelve and older.
my 10-YO daughter loved this…and is awaiting the companion novel due out this winter.
I kept getting bogged down with the science behind the asteroid…just how big does an object have to be to push the moon out of orbit?
Also…anyone that grew up with well water knows that once the power goes out water stop flowing, including to the toilet. Small editing mistake perhaps.
Love the cover, an eye catcher for the shelves.
Todd,
I thought about mentioning the questionable science. I hesitantly checked the Science Fiction category. Some of the science may not be hard science. I honestly don’t know, and it bothered me at first when I kept wondering if an asteroid could push the moon closer in orbit to the earth. But the book does a really good job of introducing questions about long-term consequences of changes brought on by global scientific phenomenon.
I loved this book. It stayed with me for weeks. I would take a shower and be so appreciative of the running water. Everyone I talked to about the book decided that we probably wouldn’t survive because our livestyles are just not set up for it.
One of my favorites in the “dystopian lit. genre”! Thanks for reviewing it, Jeannette.
[...] Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer [...]
i love the one-liners in this book
such as:
i thought the world was coming to an end, and i was going to miss the action.
I absolutley loved the book….I thought the world would come to an end when I read the book. It is definately a page turner!!!
wow. I dont think a more pointless piece of literature exists. in an effort to try to see how civilization would be forever changed in the case of such an event, we dont get to see a silver lining. the are starving, frozen and constintly at odds with each other. even though it happens, miranda is dealt way more then any normal 17YO girl needs to deal with. and the fact that people jsut pile there problems on her doesnt help….if miranda were a real person id give her a gun and a bullet
OMG could this happen? do any of us no omg this book really just scared the crap outta me i was just so scared the hole time i was like thinking what if this did happen i cant live with out my cell phone or tv or texting or makeup or showering and this poor gurl had 2 omg poor thing its almost like they are amish just with out the moon and the asstearoid thing right?
OMG! soooooooooo Good!
it was a pretty amazing book, yea, but know that i think on it, hey, didnt people in the old times go through the same freaking thing? yes, i would freak out, i mean NO TV, OH GOD!! but thats ok because what was tv to paul revere? we should all learn to ride horses and stuff. miranda and her brother got around it! why cant we?
Oh my gosh! I loved that book. I’d rather be at the movies, but that book caught me. OMG. cool book. awesomeality, honey! what if that happened to me? OMGGGG i like dan. what a book!! it had me goddamn sweating in my chiar.
lovely
I read this book in about two days. I could not put it down but i had a butt load of homework. It really made me apriciate what i have and how Miranda, the main charecter, handeled everything that was happening
my teacher is reading us this book in class, and ive got to say that its not too bad. Matter of fact i knida like it. I recommend it you sci-fi people.
[...] about the US still stand and I’m not as enamoured with it as Reading Rants, or all of these folk, but I like apocalyptic literature. I love the set up – the moon is pushed out of [...]
I was totally captivated by this book. You really just have to sit down and think. Could this happen? How long would I survive? Before you know it you’re at the store, stock piling on blankets and canned goods! I was not able to put this book down, and the ending had me both shocked and relieved. I recommend this book for anyone who needs a news flash on how fragile our current lives are, and the stakes and sacrifices need to survive them.
Ehmagawd, I loved this book. You’re exactly in Miranda’s, the main character, eyes. It is hard to believe people could, possibly, have to live like that, and yet it seems so simple and quick how it all happens.
Recommended to everyone 12+, it is slightly innapropriate with preg-talk and sleep.
This was a great book and I loved it. But I’m doing a book report and I can’t find Miranda’s last name. What is it????
omg i love this book
hey i just wanted 2 ask what the setting was in this book
does any one know where she lives?
AMAZINGGGGGGG!
Yeah she lives in Pensilvania but i loved this book. actually i am doing a reaport on it right as we speek. haha
i love this book sooooooooo much. it is not what you would think coulde happen from one small thing. i couldnt put down the book after i got started.
Does anybody know what Miranda’s last name is?
Does it say in the book what part of Pennsylvania they live in? Oh and does it say in the book what Sammi and Megan’s last name is?
I hate book reports… but I love this book!!!
Yeah. THIS. BOOK. IS. AWESOME. totally dude.
To all the previous writers – learn to spell! Then you might learn something about science too. Wells don’t run dry because of use – it’s a factor of the water table level. And water does not pump out of a well without power, and with no electricity, the sinks and toilets would not be running.
The moon would not – could not have gone from quarter to half moon, or whatever it grew into. The reflection from the sun gives the moon “light” and if it got closer to the earth in the middle of the night, it would have DECREASED in size.
This book is so full of scientific errors. But also, Dan asks Miranda to the prom in an early chapter, and then later in the story, at the hospital he tells her he was getting up the nerve to ask her. Huh?