50bookchallenge, 15000pages
Book #64 -- Susan Beth Pfeffer, Life As We Knew It, 347 pages.
An incredibly book about trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. Beginning a few days before the Event, this is the diary of a teenage girl living with her family in rural Pennsylvania, and how they cope when life as they knew it is abruptly destroyed by a rogue asteroid. I cannot stress how brilliant this book is. While most post-apocalyptic stories focus on the dramatic -- the tidal waves and volcanoes and earthquakes and such, this one is different. All those things happen, but they happen to other people, and with communication cut off, it's difficult for the main character to truly process news like "New York City is under water". What *does* begin to effect her life, however, is the ash cover from numerous volcanoes blocking the sunlight. Temperatures reach impossible lows, and frost kills all harvestable plant life. With transportation across country increasingly unreliable, Miranda and her family must face the very real possibility that they may freeze to death this winter, if they don't starve to death first. The power of this book is not in sweeping dramatic events, but in the slow, terrifying decline of hope as conditions get worse and worse and Miranda's family is forced to rely only on themselves and each other.
Progress toward goals: 181/366 = 49.4%
Books: 64/150 = 42.7%
Pages: 17723/50000 = 35.4%
2008 Book List
cross-posted to 15000pages, 50bookchallenge, and gwynraven
An incredibly book about trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. Beginning a few days before the Event, this is the diary of a teenage girl living with her family in rural Pennsylvania, and how they cope when life as they knew it is abruptly destroyed by a rogue asteroid. I cannot stress how brilliant this book is. While most post-apocalyptic stories focus on the dramatic -- the tidal waves and volcanoes and earthquakes and such, this one is different. All those things happen, but they happen to other people, and with communication cut off, it's difficult for the main character to truly process news like "New York City is under water". What *does* begin to effect her life, however, is the ash cover from numerous volcanoes blocking the sunlight. Temperatures reach impossible lows, and frost kills all harvestable plant life. With transportation across country increasingly unreliable, Miranda and her family must face the very real possibility that they may freeze to death this winter, if they don't starve to death first. The power of this book is not in sweeping dramatic events, but in the slow, terrifying decline of hope as conditions get worse and worse and Miranda's family is forced to rely only on themselves and each other.
Progress toward goals: 181/366 = 49.4%
Books: 64/150 = 42.7%
Pages: 17723/50000 = 35.4%
2008 Book List
cross-posted to 15000pages, 50bookchallenge, and gwynraven