After the Snow

Starred review from January 16, 2012
In this powerful first novel, global warming has killed the North Atlantic Current, sending the U.K. and much of the U.S. into a new ice age. Fifteen-year-old Willo—born in the barren, snow-covered mountains of northern Wales—has never known anything but the cold; half-feral, he barely listens when his father tells him stories of the times before the weather changed. Coming home from a day on the mountain, however, he finds his family has been taken away by government men. Then, heading back up the mountain, seeking refuge from the weather, cannibals, and feral dogs, Willo stumbles on two abandoned children. His first instinct is to “go quick away from those kids just standing all frozen and starving with their dark eyes begging me,” but his basic humanity eventually intervenes. This brutal and at times terrifying postapocalyptic tale features a well-developed first-person narrator, strong secondary characters, and spare but compelling language. Despite its grim take on humanity’s willingness to do evil, it also demonstrates that, even under the most straitened circumstances, people are capable of unexpected kindness and altruism. Ages 12–up. Agent: Greenhouse Literary Agency.

Starred review from January 15, 2012
Debut author Crockett's poetic first-person narrative depicts an adolescent's coming of age amid wartime havoc and an unforgiving, possibly post-apocalyptic winter. When Willo's family vanishes from their wintry cabin, he sets out on his own to find them, leaving his home in the hills for the nearby town, which is undergoing a Nazi-like occupation. The war is a nebulous monster; though Crockett alludes to World War II, she never fully explicates the novel's timeframe, which may frustrate some readers. Willo's inventive argot is part-urban vernacular and part-forester twang, and though it offers no clues as to setting or time, it conveys exceptional metaphors that evoke nature and the elements. People Willo has trusted betray him in the face of scarce food and the authorities' hunt for a faceless resistance, but he perseveres, seizing opportunities to earn his bread and doggedly pursuing information about his father. On his journey he meets a young girl who turns out to possess unexpected significance in the political landscape, figuring even in his own legacy, a thing he discovers in his difficult search. Willo endures cruel brutality, but Crockett renders in him an intense psychological transformation that is authentic to his character and his circumstances, culminating in discovery of his own voice and vision. A sentimental tale of hardships, resilience and first-time experiences that illustrates a universal truism: Hope springs eternal in the young. (Fiction. 12 & up)

COPYRIGHT(2012) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from March 1, 2012

Gr 8 Up-What if, instead of a warmer future, "every thing got proper cold"? What if "the seas stopped working," and those who didn't move to the crowded, smelly cities approved by the government became "stealers" and "stragglers" and lived off the grid? Russia and China are big influences in this new order, and the yuan is the preferred currency. Willo's family are stragglers, living in the frigid mountains of Wales. Willo has a talent for hunting and helps his father turn hides into finely crafted coats, boots, and gloves. Cat and dog make the finest furs, though Willo catches mostly rabbits. When he returns from a hunt to find the cabin deserted, he knows something bad has happened. He packs a sled with supplies and heads off to find his family. His first encounter is with Mary, almost starving, whose father is a pony man, also missing. Willo intends to take Mary only as far as the power lines, where she can be picked up by a snow truck, but events tumble both teens onto a transport into the city. The bones of this story are not new: civilization trying to reform after human-caused catastrophe. Some people try to make a better world, and others ask only what's in it for them. What elevates Snow is the voice Crockett uses to tell the tale. Willo's narration, with misspellings and inventive phrasings, is a voice we have not heard before. Graphic violence occurs in several places, but Crockett's cold, brutal world is not without a few warm rooms where travelers can rest and prepare for the next challenge.-Maggie Knapp, Trinity Valley School, Fort Worth, TX

Copyright 2012 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 1, 2012
Grades 8-12 People barely remember the time before the new Ice Age. Now, punishing snow is a year-round occurrence, and 15-year-old Willo and his family scrape out a living in the wilderness, trapping animals for skins that they can then sell to what remains of the government. One day Willo's family vanishes, and so he starts toward the violent, miserable, beggar-filled city to find them. Along the way he runs across a freezing little girl and decides to save herdespite the advice of the dog, an imaginary companion who offers cold, survivalist advice from the dog skull Willo keeps lashed to his hat. At its best, this bleak debut recalls Patrick Ness' The Knife of Never Letting Go (2008) and Cormac McCarthy's The Road (2006), with the brave young narrator navigating the horrors of a wasted world in broken English ( she look like a worm do ). There is a staginess to the ending that feels incongruous with the naturalistic style of the rest of the book, but nevertheless this marks Crockett as a writer to watch.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)