Day Zero

November 1, 2019
A near-future political thriller about change and agency. In the United States, two new political parties emerge from the ashes of the New Depression--The Opposition and The Spark. When The Opposition, under the leadership of the charismatic Ammon Carver, unexpectedly wins the election, the country is thrown into a state of befuddled disarray, made worse by terrorist attacks on the banking system that soon lead to curtailed civil liberties. Seventeen-year-old Susan "Jinx" Marshall is a coder who just wants to have fun gaming, but her family is caught in the middle of it all: Her stepfather is framed for the attacks, and her survivalist, tech genius father might have the answers to what is really happening. On the run with her little brother, Charles, and her stepsiblings, MacKenna and Toby, Jinx has to remember all those weekend doomsday drills her father put her through if she wants to survive as the world collapses around them. Jinx's arc from passive onlooker to an agent for change who will do anything to protect those she cares about is at the core of a compelling, action-packed story about family ties, politics, and revolution. The villains come across as simplistic, but the divisive political environment from which they arise reads as genuinely terrifying and plausible. Jinx and her family are white; one important secondary character is Mexican American. Fast-paced, topical, and engaging. (Thriller. 14-adult)

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