This World We Live In (Life As We Knew It Series #3) »

SUSAN BETH PFEFFER is the author of many books for teens, including Life As We Knew It, The Dead and The Gone, and the bestselling novel The Year Without Michael. She lives in Middletown, New York.

www.susanbethpfeffer.blogspot.com

It’s been a year since a meteor collided with the moon, catastrophically altering the earth’s climate. For Miranda Evans, life as she knew it no longer exists. Her friends and neighbors are dead, the landscape is frozen, and food is increasingly scarce.

The struggle to survive intensifies when Miranda’s father and stepmother arrive with a baby and three strangers in tow. One of the newcomers is Alex Morales, and as Miranda’s complicated feelings for him turn to love, his plans for his future thwart their relationship. Then a devastating tornado hits the town of Howell, and Miranda makes a decision that will change their lives forever.

Publishers Weekly

The protagonists of Pfeffer's novels The Dead and the Gone and Life As We Knew It join forces in this third installment of a harrowing saga set in the not so distant future. A year after the moon was thrown off course by a meteor, natural disasters and climate changes on Earth are still making mere existence a challenge. Miranda's family is barely scraping by on food rations when Miranda's father, stepmother, their baby, and three other refugees show up unexpectedly. Despite there now being more mouths to feed, Miranda's mother welcomes them, and Miranda finds herself falling in love with Alex, one of the refugees, as they spend hours together, scavenging abandoned houses for essentials. Pfeffer masterfully evokes the cold, colorless world in which her characters reside. Moments of relief are frequently tinged with horror, as when Miranda and Alex must bypass a rotting corpse to get to a horde of food. Still, hope is never completely extinguished. Throughout, readers will be moved by displays of compassion, strength, and faith as characters endure grim realities and face an uncertain future. Ages 12-up. (Apr.)