Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

Life As We Knew It is written in diary form by 15 year old Miranda. Her life seems average with friends, sports, class frustrations, and college worries. She briefly mentions a news report about an asteroid hitting the moon, but it’s nothing serious. In fact, there are viewing parties planned and her teachers have taken ALL the fun out of it with tons of moon-themed assignments. The night arrives and it’s actually kind of exciting until the screaming starts. It turns out that the astronomers vastly underestimated the density of the asteroid and after impact the moon begins to grow larger in the sky until collision seems a distinct possibility. Almost immediately the consequences of the moon’s nearness begin to manifest themselves and Miranda rightly fears that her life will never be the same.

I love dystopian fiction. There, I’ve said it. Even though Miranda’s near constant mantra of “How can things get any worse?” got on my nerves a bit (Really. I thought everyone knows never to ask that question…) I have to imagine that many in her position would say the same. The dialog was great and I thought the sequence of events flowed naturally and realistically. This is the first in a trilogy and I’m eagerly looking forward to the second, The Dead and the Gone, when I finish this crazy month of July!