Ashfall and the Natural Disaster YA Novel

In this era of climate change, I sometimes wonder why there aren't more "what happens after we screw up the atmosphere" books. Then again, maybe there are. All those books that take place after society crumbles - maybe the situation that caused society to crumble was global warming.

The few books I've read that explore the world after a sudden climate shift - namely, Ashfall and The World as We Knew It - involve a climactic event that had nothing to do with humans. In Ashfall, the book I read most recently, the event in question is a supervolcano eruption that fills the sky with ash and causes a volcanic winter.

The book had gotten very good reviews, so I must say I was disappointed. I found the main character rather whiny, even in the face of his repeated claims that he had changed sooooo much since the eruption. I also found the action to be rather flat - a whole book of two teenagers trudging through the show and trying not to get shot. There weren't many surprises or many moments where I could barely wait to see what happens next. Reading the book seemed like slogging through the ashy snow alongside the characters, and it didn't do it for me.

I was hoping it would at least make me think about something - for example, what would we do in the face of a major climactic disaster, provided it was so sudden we didn't have time to prepare? But honestly, it didn't. The book stuck so closely to the main character's journey through the snow that it didn't even touch on how the world was reacting. It mentioned VERY briefly that his hometown was characterized as a "red zone," and the overcrowded refugee camp where he ended up was a "yellow zone." But we didn't really find out what that meant, except that it restricted people's movements.

I found myself wishing the story to be told from a different perspective, or at least to have other perspectives added. Maybe it would have been more compelling if the character was the son of a government official who was trying to figure out how to deal with the disaster, for example. Or maybe if they had spent more time in the refugee camp, where regulations kept people from helping as much as they wanted to. That was the part I found most compelling.

I wonder if books will start to come out in the upcoming years that focus on the world after climate change, or that involve that particular element. I'd like to get some comments and discussions going on here, so I put to you this question - what would you like to see in a post-climate change dystopian book? Have you read any? What questions did they invoke?

Thanks in advance for sharing!

Son - a Dystopia/Fantasy Crossover?

Apologies for the delay in creating a new post. A virus carried by the World Wide Web led everyone in my town to believe that they were howler monkeys; meanwhile, poison in the rivers made all our toes fall off and left us vulnerable to takeover by a rogue group of terrorists who had made housecats into an army of darkness.

Or I got lazy. You pick.

In either case, I promised a review of Lois Lowry's Son, and I am here to deliver. It's been a month or so since I finished it, but I doubt it has changed much since then.

It began in the Community made famous by her earlier novel, The Giver. Taking the perspective of a young girl assigned to be Birth Mother, it began by leading readers through the Community's systematic process of creating new human life. Mother and child were separated, as is the custom in the Community. Atypically, though, the mother couldn't seem to forget the child she had brought into the world. She found the boy in the Nurturing Center and forged a connection with him, which led to her following him out of the Community when he...

OK, no spoilers. Suffice it to say that she followed him into danger and spent a very, very long time trying to re-connect with him.

The lingering question is, is it a fitting sequel to The Giver - perhaps one of the first dystopian novels in modern YA fiction? Does it do the series justice?

At first.

The first third of the book is truly compelling. We look through the eyes of a teenage girl assigned to the "job" of being pregnant and then delivering a baby, then continue on with her as she tries to forget the strongest bond known to humankind. The Community is just as disturbingly sanitary as it was in The Giver, and the people just as unconsciously restless and unfulfilled.

But after the main character leaves the Community, things get weird. Supernatural events start to happen; mystical personages appear and alter things with magic spells and the like. And to be honest, I felt a bit betrayed. I had picked up a dystopian novel set in an altered society that I could believe was probable, given certain developments in human history. Then Lowry changed the rules, and I was in a fantasy world or on some alien planet. I wasn't sure, and I hadn't signed on for this.

Don't get me wrong; I love fantasy and sci-fi. But I also like to know what to expect, and this wasn't it. I felt like the social constructs of the Community were no longer a commentary on our own, but a made-up world I couldn't relate to. I wasn't sure what was going on, or what she was trying to say, and I can't say that I liked it.

Perhaps if I'd known what was coming, I would have felt better about it. But in all honesty, I wish I'd stopped when mother and baby left the Community. Up until then, it was golden.

On Dystopia

I was going to call it "What's New in YA," but I avoided the moniker for two reasons. First, it sounded unbelievably cliche and boring. Second, I don't plan on posting solely about new works. There are a lot of older YA books that are still relevant and have a profound impact on the genre. Take The Giver, for example.

First published in 1994 (according to an Amazon review), it chronicles the painful and ecstatic and life-changing journey of a boy chosen to be the only one in his community to understand human emotion. Protagonist Jonas lives in a society that has been carefully planned. People are assigned to their jobs, their spouses, and even their children. But when the time comes for his job selection, he is given the title of "receiver." He soon discovers that what he is to receive is all memory of humanity - the past that the community has left behind, and all of the pain and pleasure that came along with it.

At the time of its publication,The Giver was lauded by audiences and experts for its unique structure and thought-provoking concept. It is still an outstanding literary example, of course. Now, though - almost 20 years later - it fits nicely into a genre that didn't exist at the time of its publication. The young adult dystopian novel.

Dystopia is everywhere in YA these days. From The Hunger Games to Uglies (both of which will be addressed in later posts), YA authors seem almost obsessed with the idea of examining what will happen when humanity destroys itself and has to start over. Maybe this is because the genre targets the young, who have the most invested in the direction the world is headed. Maybe it has more to do with the authors themselves and their desire to envision a different future - an endeavor that almost begs for an adolescent protagonist. Or that these stories present the chance to "hold the mirror up to nature" and show the world what could happen if we're not careful. Or if we're too careful.

So, what about the new Lois Lowry book - the sequel to The Giver? Does it stand up to the high standards set forth in the original? Is it more or less dystopian? Stay tuned...