This is the question that haunts Amina as she watches new and horrible stories of discord and crisis flash across the news every day.
But when she starts at prestigious Gardner Academy, Amina finds a group of like-minded peers to join forces with—fast friends who dedicate their year to learning survival skills from each other, before it’s too late.
Still, as their prepper knowledge multiplies, so do their regular high school problems, from relationship drama to family issues to friend blow-ups. Juggling the two parts of their lives forces Amina to ask another vital question: Is it worth living in the hypothetical future if it’s at the expense of your actual present?
Prepping is edging into the mainstream, especially after the year we've had. Everyone is starting to see that having a few packs of toilet paper and some cans put by isn't such a bad idea, and more novels are starting to reflect that. Including this odd duck.
If you're reading it looking for survival tips, you won't get any, except maybe during Wyatt's game. This novel isn't actually about survivalism, you see; that's just the hook that drew the characters together. Each character has an interest that's relevant a few times, depending on who they are. Amina's interest is 'being Jewish'. Chloe's is 'being internet famous'. Hunter wants to pretend he isn't his father's son, and Jo and Wyatt are mysteries most of the way through.
It's not an awful read, it's just that nothing seems to have any weight. They go to an oil line protest at Hunter's bequest, but we never find out if they were successful or not ... because, again, the protest wasn't the point, it was just a way for Hunter to get a tiny crumb of information about his brother. Chloe's naked pictures are sent all around the school and apart from her hiding away for a day or two, there's nothing. No investigation, no sideways looks, not even a ribald comment from the jocks. Amina is dead set against going to the school at first, but within two weeks she loves it there and admits ... to herself, not to her parents. ... that they were right to send her. There's no consistency. Even at the very end; the actions of one character should have massive consequences, so everyone splits off, goes for a holiday, promises to think and make a decision afterwards, and on the next page
It's extremely frustrating, because the bones of a great story are there. There's a wonderful moment where Amina talks to her roommate and they realise that they've been seeing the same events through different lenses, lenses which have left them thinking that the other doesn't like them. It's very cleverly written and really made me think.
It's just a shame the whole book wasn't like that.
How to Pack for the End of the World publishes on the 10th November, 2020.
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