This award-winning book is a sci-fi adventure that clips along while still managing to hit a wide-range of themes: the love and value of family, the worth of stories and storytellers, assimilation and homogeneity, distorted dystopian values and tyranny, and a few other. The protagonist, Lita, is focused (obsessed?) with becoming a storyteller like her grandmother and the weaving of personal experience into stories receives prime air time in this novel. Lita is a determined heroine, and although there are other supporting characters, this is really a story about Lita.

There are a lot of fantasy books for middle grade readers, but this is a rare entry of sci-fi/dystopian fiction for that reading group. The age of the protagonist is 12 and readers in the 11 to 12-year-old range will especially identify with Lita; however, the dystopian themes will also appeal to readers older than 12.

Content Analysis:

Profanity/Language: 5 religious exclamations.

Violence/Gore: Character is shocked as part of a medical procedure; painful and slightly frightening medical procedure; destruction of the earth and most of the people by an asteroid (implied, understood that this is/did happen); gun shots are heard and people with weapons are seen storming a ship; report that a ship is destroyed with its inhabitants; description of removing tonsils; explosion causing damage; character is being punished by being exposed to foreign elements as part of an experiment, death implied; development of a toxin with intent to use it to kill; implied early end to many individuals (including children) who were in hibernation–exact status or details are unclear; people brainwashed against their will; person is taken away as punishment.

Sex/Nudity: Character looks at pictures of a girl with her two mothers.

Mature Subject Matter:

Apocalyptic end of the earth and its inhabitants, loss of family, death, dystopian society and ideals, brain-washing aka reprogramming.

Alcohol/Drug Use:

Reference to a memory of kids playing with their dad’s cigars; many characters drink brightly colored drinks that are used to stabilize their moods; poison is developed to eliminate threats (implied that these threats are humans).