Science+Fiction

=Life As We Knew It=
 * By Susan Beth Pfeiffer**[[image:life_as_we_knew_it.jpg align="left" link="http://www.amazon.com/Life-Knew-Susan-Beth-Pfeffer/dp/0152061541/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1229444612&sr=1-1"]]

= = = = =Summary= When a meteor hits the moon, Miranda must learn to survive the unimaginable. Told in journal entries, this is the heart-pounding story of Miranda's struggle to hold on to the most important resource of all--hope--in an increasingly desperate and unfamiliar world.

I really liked this book. Miranda learns that the things she thought were important are really not. Now she is concerned with basic needs like food, water, electricity, clean clothes and heat. Her ever resourceful mother manages to help the family survive but it is Miranda who saves them in the end. Her character evolves from an ordinary girl to one who is strong and independent.
 * My Review**

A meteor is going to hit the moon, and 16-year-old Miranda, like the rest of her family and neighbors in rural Pennsylvania, intends to watch it from the comfort of a lawn chair in her yard. But the event is not the benign impact predicted. The moon is knocked closer to Earth, setting off a chain of horrific occurrences: tsunamis, earthquakes, and, later, volcanic eruptions that disrupt life across the planet. Written in the form of Miranda's diary, this disquieting and involving story depicts one family's struggle to survive in a world where food, warmth, and well-being disappear in the blink of an eye. As life goes from bad to worse, Miranda struggles to find a way to survive both mentally and physically, discovering strength in her family members and herself. This novel will inevitably be compared to Meg Rosoff's Printz Award Book, //How I Live Now// (2004). Pfeffer doesn't write with Rosoff's startling eloquence, and her setup is not as smooth (Why don't scientists predict the possibility of this outcome?). But Miranda and her family are much more familiar than Rosoff's characters, and readers will respond to the authenticity and immediacy of their plight. Each page is filled with events both wearying and terrifying and infused with honest emotions. Pfeffer brings cataclysmic tragedy very close.
 * Booklist Review**

IleneCooper.

[|Discussion Guide from the Multnomah Library] (also includes other books to like this one).

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