Tips for Surviving a Snow Apocalypse (hint: Must. Have. Coffee.)

I’m going to preface this by saying apparently I am a big baby who wouldn’t last long in an apocalypse. The funny thing is I’ve been reading so many YA books about the subject lately I thought I was an expert. Go north, is one of the tidbits I learned. Because everyone else will be heading south and you want to avoid the mass chaos. This, from Ilsa’s Bick’s brilliant zombie disaster novel, Ashes. There’s also this little gem from Mike Mullin’s gritty, realistic, page-turner Ashfall: get your hands on a good pair of cross-country skis. You’ll need these to traverse the volcano ash landscape. Good idea, too, to have a safe house to hole up in, such as a school. (Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts.) And a large selection of canned goods and blankets are essential. (Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer)

Unfortunately, none of these books prepared me for the College Road Trip from Hell that happened to coincide with the freak snowstorm that attacked New England last weekend. My son and I planned this excursion around his fall break, thinking we might fit in some pretty leaf-peeping action. Okay, that was my thought. I don’t think my son cares one way or another about fall color. Anyhoo, we were staying with my brother and his family (lovely wife and four little kids) in their beautiful new house in a gloriously wooded area of central Connecticut. Remember the gloriously wooded part. It plays an important role later. We knew snow was heading that way but my brother assured me we could make it up to Williamstown, Mass, tucked away in the Berkshires near the Vermont border, and back before it hit.

We should’ve known when we got lost on the way there, that trouble was ahead. Here’s a handy tip for the Apocalypse: Carry a map. The paper kind. Instead of relying on your car’s GPS. GPS’s don’t do well when it comes to detours and road closures. Not many alternate routes around the beautiful North Adams area of New England. I know this because we doubled around that sparsely populated, hilly, windy-road section of Massachusetts for most of the day, prompting my frustrated brother to say: "All roads lead to North Adams. But NONE lead out of it."

The college was great. When we finally made it there. Bucolic town. Friendly sweet students. Good food at one of the local eateries. And good thing we ate before we left. Cue: ominous music.

The snow was just starting to fall when we left. And promptly got lost again. In near white-out conditions, my calm-on-the-outside brother drove us around those same windy, hilly roads. Within minutes there were two or three inches of thick snow on the ground. And on the car. And building up around the windshield wipers. Another helpful tip: treat windshield wipers with care. When my brother reached out the window to tap the caked snow off, the left wiper broke and he spent the remainder of the five hour drive leaning across the seat, his face inches from the windshield. Trees creaked and fell around us. We came within an inch of hitting a guardrail once. We couldn’t see if the road went up or down or curved until we were right upon it.

It took three hours to drive seven miles. But at last we made it to the promised land: I-91. And we breathed a sigh of relief. Until my sister-in-law called to say that they had no power at home. When we crossed the border into Connecticut, it looked like a bomb had gone off. Driving into my brother’s lovely wooded neighborhood was one of the scariest experiences I’ve ever had. Trees were literally dropping and snapping power lines as we crawled past.

I will skip ahead to say that we survived. And when I say we, I mean my son and me. My brother and his family are still out there, still surviving in that decimated landscape. Trees down everywhere. Wires dangling over the roads. Few stores and gas stations open. Halloween cancelled. (Yes. Sadly for the four little kiddos.) And worse, only a handful of Dunkin Donuts open and shining like beacons to the caffeine addled junkie refugees lined up in the street to get their morning coffee fix. None of the apocalyptic books I’ve read have mentioned coffee. It’s a stunning oversight. Aside. To the clueless woman in line who wanted her toddler to decide which kind of munchkin she wanted—honey, do you want the munchkin with sprinkles or the chocolate one or how about that silly pumpkin one?—while the line snaked out the door filled with people contemplating double homicide: For the love of God, Woman, choose a damn munchkin for your kid and move the bleep ON.) 

The final night my brother got a hotel reservation for us at the airport. My sister-in-law drove us and the weary, bath-deprived little kids up there, and we talked up the place like it was a Club Med. (Lights. Warmth. A TV!!!) Unconscionably, the hotel people failed to mention that there was no power at the hotel. My traumatized sister-in-law decided to take the kids back to my brother’s office for the night, but I had her drop my son and me off at the dark airport hotel. There we paid for a pitch-black (but warm!!!) room. We lurched around using our dying cell-phones as light and avoided the cold showers. It was the best money I ever spent in my life.

The next day we flew out of battle-scarred Connecticut, bleary-eyed survivors of the Snow Apocalypse, coffee cups gripped in our shaky hands.

PS. I’ve sworn off apocalyptic literature. I’ve lived it. 

The End of the World as We Know It: The Latest in Apocalyptic Fiction

When I was in high school, I was convinced I would never make it out. Maybe all teens have a touch of this fatalistic sense—that they can’t possibly ever grow old, that no way can the world keep spinning, especially as you begin to look around and notice what a big mess things are. Wars, natural disasters, disease, never mind the cruddy way people generally treat each other. And teens are very stuck in the moment, thinking that things can never be so horrible as they are NOW, for THEM. When I was a teen, the Soviets shot down an airliner that had strayed into their airspace and the news was talking about how it might be the start of World War Three. The nuclear war disaster flick The Day After came out on TV, and I stayed up late to watch it. I believed that it was only a matter of time before some loony warmonger pushed the wrong button. The signs were everywhere…

But here I am. Older than I ever thought I’d be, raising two teens who are noticing the sometimes sad state of the world and wondering how it can possibly go on like this. My son read Cormac McCarthy’s post apocalyptic nightmare The Road a few months ago and asked me if we should start stockpiling canned goods. I’ve read that book too and halfway through found myself scrolling around on Mormon websites. (They have really good tips on rotating your pantry, in case anyone’s wondering.)

Last week I read the new novel everyone is buzzing about, a YA version of The Road that has the added element of zombies. Like the poor survivors of the apocalypse need anything else to worry about. The book is Ashes by Ilsa Bick and it’s brilliant. I’m giving you fair warning here. If you get your hands on it, clear your schedule. You won’t be able to put it down. Having a well-stocked pantry will help too, so you won’t have to worry about that while you’re reading. Also, you might want to reconsider your squeamishness about guns. Guns are big in this book. You need them to fight off the freaking zombies.

Before I sell you on Ashes, I want to say a word about dystopian fiction (a fancy way of describing End of the World books). This is the latest trend in YA fiction. I don’t know if it’s ever not been a trend. But it’s very big right now and kind of bleeding into other genres such as fantasy and science fiction. These books all have their own take on the apocalypse and/or its aftermath. Here are a few of the really good ones I’ve read lately, in no particular order:

1. The new classic that all of these are measured against is the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. If you’ve been living under a rock, here's the rundown: a sick, gritty society emerges after the end of the world in which kids compete in real-life, Survivor-style games for the entertainment of the privileged. The “lucky” selected boy/girl pairs are thrown onto a nightmare TV show set where they literally must kill each other. It’s horrifying, addictive, thought provoking and masterfully written. And there’s a movie coming out soon. Added bonus: all three books have been written so you can read them all without waiting.

2. Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts (official release date is November 2011) is a teen twist on Stephen King’s The Stand. The narrative alternates between the points of view of various kids across the country as the end of the world begins. There’s an added pressure of townspeople turning on each other in zombie-like rage. And there will be sequels. In fact all of the books on my list are part of a series. Something that sort of ticks me off. Can’t a book just END anymore? Give the reader a satisfying conclusion? Tie up all the loose ends in one neat volume? Apparently not.

3. Matched and Crossed by Ally Condie. I’ve blogged about these before because they are SO good. They take place well after the apocalypse and society has evolved and/or degenerated to the point that nearly everything is decided for its members, including who they will marry. One girl buys into all of this until she’s mistakenly given two “matches,” which gets her questioning the system and wondering what else the powers that be have gotten wrong.

4. Across the Universe by Beth Revis is dystopian on a space ship. The world is so messed up a few scientists volunteer to be cryogenically frozen and put on a ship for hundreds of years to start anew on another planet. A larger number of volunteers have been running the ship and their descendants grow up not knowing exactly how it all started. One girl who is frozen with her parents wakes up to find that someone has (inadvertently/purposely?) pulled the plug on her. And the ship she’s trapped on is VERY unlike the world she left behind.

5. Ashfall by Mike Mullin. More realistic and therefore more disturbing. The super volcano lying (supposedly) dormant under Yellowstone erupts and destroys half the country. A fifteen year old boy has the bad luck to have been left home alone for the weekend while his parents visit relatives he doesn’t particularly feel like visiting. The book is his horrifying journey to find his family.

6. Delirium by Lauren Oliver. Long after the apocalypse we find ourselves in a world where love is defined as a disease. The solution is some kind of surgery to take away desire. Our heroine is all set for her cure when she falls in love. Teen girls LOVE this book. And adults (okay, just women, let’s be honest here) will read it and remember those crazed romantic feelings churned up when they first fell.

And now to Ashes.

The author Ilsa Bick (and let me just pause to say that I love the name Ilsa) throws her heroine Alex into a non-stop, heart-pounding, terrifying adventure. At the beginning, ironically, Alex's world already feels like it’s over. She has a brain tumor and knows she’s dying. Her parents died years before and because the tumor robbed Alex of her sense of smell, she can hardly remember them anymore (funny how closely our memories and sense of smell are intertwined). On a final trip to say goodbye—Alex is hiking in the mountains to scatter her parents’ ashes—BAM—comes the end of the world. In this case it’s an electromagnetic pulse which destroys all electronic devices and causes most people to drop dead. (Sheesh, do we need another fear?) Throw in a bratty kid and a marine on the run/possible romantic interest. Also add flesh-eating zombies. And a cliffhanger at the end of EVERY chapter that amps up the tension to heights you can’t imagine. Ilsa isn’t totally heartless. SPOILER ALERT: Alex gets her sense of smell back. And possibly a super power. Another warning: there will be sequels. That you will have to wait for.

Not sure what it is exactly that attracts me to these end of the world books. My son, after his class read The Road and his classmates dragged around depressed for weeks, has a theory that these novels aren’t as dark as they appear on the surface. Sure, they take the negative elements of our world to their extreme and terrifying conclusions, but in the end, there is always at least one person standing. See, these books are really about the resiliency of the human spirit. If that volcano explodes or we poison ourselves or blow the planet to smithereens, someone’s going to be left to carry on.

Let’s hope it’s a couple of kids.

With possibly a gun. And some nonperishable food.

Fearing a Zombie Apocalypse? I Have a Solution

I’ve just returned from a marathon college road trip with my son, his best friend, and his best friend’s mother, Lisa. We traversed the state of Pennsylvania, entered the Twilight Zone of freakily designed highways (Route One outside Princeton), and took in the glory of the Hudson River Valley in New York. In the back seat the boys watched every Star Wars movie in random order, while occasionally helping the mothers navigate. (And by navigate I mean we screamed at them and they pecked at smart phone buttons and lazily offered directions.)

Fun quotes from the trip:
“How did people ever get where they were going without smart phones?”
“When I get married my wife better be a cartographer.” (Best friend’s reply: “Yeah, but just because she could make maps, doesn’t mean she could read them.”)
“I don’t really care where Betsy Ross’s house is.”
“That’s no moon. That’s a space station.” Also: “Jar Jar, throw me the Booba!”

Anyway, we had a grand old time despite several moments of mildly shattered illusions.

Mildly shattered illusion numero uno was my long awaited trip through Pennsylvania Dutch Country. A little history: my husband and I have driven route 76 through PA many times, and every time I toy with the idea of swinging down to Lancaster to spy on the Amish. (This wish is tied with my husband’s desire to take an exit off 55 South in Arkansas to eat at a restaurant that touts on its interstate sign that it’s the "Home of The Throwed Rolls." My husband’s heard that you sit at your table and the waitstaff literally throws rolls at you. Whenever we blow by that exit, he sighs and says, “Maybe next time.”) We were making good time on 76 so Lisa agreed to a stop in Amish Country.

Well. It was just disappointing on so many levels. Sure, there were some quaint farms and the stray horse and buggy. But mostly it was just a string of crappy touristy stores and restaurants. One sold Amish Barbecue. Which we passed on.

Mildly shattered illusion number two was our realization that college tour guides stretch the truth on campus tours. (Okay, sometimes they just make stuff up off the top of their heads.) Our sweet entertaining guide at Princeton pointed at a building where she said Einstein had his lab. She told us it was kept like a room in a museum and we could go up and look at it after the tour. Lisa and I dragged the uninterested boys all over campus later to find the building again.

Three different passersby gave us directions to the room, which we eventually found, locked. Fourth passerby shook her head and said it was a professor’s office. “But it’s supposed to be Einstein’s lab,” I told her. To which she answered: “I don’t know why they tell people that.”

By now you may be wondering what this blog has to do with a zombie apocalypse. All week I was reading the novel Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts. (Simon Schuster. Release date: Nov, 2011). Young Adult literature is awash lately in post-apocalyptic novels and I have read my fair share of them. The best, imho, is the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. I also liked Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan (The title alone is awesome); Matched by Ally Condie (Just got the ARC of the sequel Crossed and have high hopes for it); and Across the Universe by Beth Revis. These books all have one thing in common: they take place years after some cataclysmic event destroys society as we know it.

Dark Inside, however, plops the reader right there, in the moments leading up to and during the cataclysmic event itself. I was at the edge of my seat with this book. It didn’t help that some of the nail-biting action took place on public transportation and I was reading bits of it while shuttling my son around the Philly subway system.

The book is basically a teen version of Stephen King’s The Stand. Multiple characters experience the beginnings of the end of the world and eventually meet up to figure out what to do next. Loved it for its straightforward language, complex character development, and absorbing, suspenseful plot. I’m already eagerly awaiting the sequel.

Every now and then, on walks across bucolic campuses or during traffic jams when the boys were between Star Wars movies, I’d mention something that was going on in my Dark Inside book. So on the way home, when Lisa decided that she needed to redeem the Amish culture in my eyes by taking me through Ohio Amish country, apocalypses seemed to be in the back of everyone’s mind.

We stopped at a store, which she said was where real Amish people shopped. At first the boys didn’t want to get out of the car. (These were the final hours of the marathon trip and they were begging to just get home.) But eventually they turned off their electronic devices and followed us into a 32,000 square-foot wonderland of 19th century necessities. Hand cranked washing machines. Composting toilets. Oil lamps. The boys drank smoothies made by a cheerful, pink-faced Amish girl and plotted out strategies for holing up in this store in case of an Apocalypse.

I am sorry that I cannot share the name, cough, Lehmans, located on 289 Kursen Road, Dalton Ohio, cough cough because, as my son just reminded me when I told him about the subject of this blog: “But then everyone would go there.”

Here's my final word on the matter: print the directions out now. You probably won’t get a good signal from your smart phone when the end of the world begins.