When the power went off on Monday afternoon this week it was off at my house and office so I could no longer write and edit things. Instead, I picked up my review copy of Ellen Parent’s new book, “After The Fall” and settled in for a big read.
I was riveted. It’s a dystopian tale, set decades into the future after a climate crisis has changed the planet – and left Vermont an independent Republic patrolled against outsiders by the Green Mountain Boys.
It’s dark, literally and emotionally. It’s dark because there’s very limited electricity and people eschew it as evil, some making the sign of the cross or shielding themselves when they encounter it. It’s dark and scary and the heroine, June, is 15, with pronounced scars resulting from a fire that separated her from her mother and landed her in a foster situation with another child she treats as a brother.
The writing is crisp and evocative with Parent spooling out details about what led to the apocalypse at a compelling and intriguing rate. The characters are vivid and believable and worrisome. Evil is afoot and June wants to know why.
I won’t spoil the story by revealing more but I’m really glad the power went out and I picked up this book. It’s the kind of book I’m thinking about while I’m doing other things and that I want to get back to! But P.S. in the book very, very few people can read! June can and that fact helps her as she tries to find her mother and figure out what really happened. This is a ripping read.
Parent teaches 10th- to 12th- grade English at Harwood and lives in Williamstown. In 2014 she was shortlisted for the Vermont Writers Prize. In 2022 her short fiction was a runner-up for the Mike Resnick Memorial Award for fiction. Additionally, her poetry has been published in Bloodroot, Vermont Magazine, and Birchsong. This is her first novel.
