Tag Archives: climate change

Climate Change

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Cracked and crumbling, the earth once full of life and water lays barren and dry. Dust bunnies blow across the land without a single living thing in sight. Blue skies turn gray and smoky. Trees that once seemed to hold up the sky with their strong arms are now reduced to stumps. That is the future that lays ahead. 

Climate change has always been a big problem. Politicians ignore it as if they weren’t the ones who created it. Advocates protest, and we turn a blind eye. Brushing it off like it’s nothing, a mere annoyance. No one expects the earth to crumble away in their lifetime. We flourish in our big cities focusing only on what’s ahead of us, but not what’s above or below us. We move too fast to acknowledge problems that seem to loom ahead. Problems that are screaming to be solved. Problems that are bolded and put in italics for us to see. Problems that are shoved in our faces but we choose to ignore.

So what if the earth is dying? Why should I care? It won’t happen in my life so there’s no reason for me to do anything. These are all excuses. Excuses not to care nor act. Excuses to not do anything. We waste our lives away waiting for someone else to do it for us. We wait and wait and never yet to consider that everyone else may be waiting too. 

There must be something done soon, or there wouldn’t be an earth to worry about.

Books about climate change are available to check out from the Mission Viejo Library. They are also available to download for free from Libby.

The Lost Code by Kevin Emerson

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The Lost Code by Kevin Emerson is a gruesome dystopian book about the cold and calloused scientific curiosity seeping through our world.

The year is 2086. In a bloodstained dystopian world, the ozone layer is gone, making the sun a daily enemy. Antarctica is no more, the ocean having swallowed up its icy coasts. 

Pollution. Radiation. Death.

These are normal words in 18-year old Owen Parker’s vocabulary. Headed to Camp Eden, a safe bio-dome, he worries about normal things a teenager should: how to fit in, and how to impress the cryptic and beautiful lifeguard, Lilly Ishani. But when he nearly drowns in the Eden lake, and somehow grows gills, he realizes that Eden is not what it seems. Along with the rest of the “Gill Gang” including Lilly, he sets out to investigate the mysterious death of a young girl at Eden. As Owen spirals deeper and deeper into a tale of hope and sorrow, of love and hate, of yin and yang itself, what he finds will change him forever.

This book is set in a dark dystopian world of 2086, after the ozone layer is severely depleted and Antarctica has melted, raising the sea level. The world is divided into the American Continent, the Northern Federation, and Eurasia. There is also a literal giant island of floating trash where some of the story takes place, called Floatia. The story mainly takes place inside the giant bio-dome of Eden, which is the polar opposite of the dark polluted world outside.

On a scale of one to ten I would rate The Lost Code a nine out of ten. Overall, it was an amazing, albeit scary book. It was slightly terrifying because our world is well on the way to becoming the shattered, hopeless world described in the book. This book is also for slightly mature audiences as well, which I was not prepared for. It wasn’t necessarily bad, I just wasn’t prepared for it.

-Vaidehi B.

The Roar by Emma Clayton

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The Roar by Emma Clayton is a dystopian science fiction book that re-examines what it really means to be human.

In the (not so) distant future, the entire human population is squeezed into a third of the land that it once occupied, behind an impenetrable gray wall. Society’s distinctions are more emphasized than ever, with all the rich living in the Golden Turrets, and those not so fortunate shoved underneath, deprived of sun and water, into the Shadows. An animal plague has destroyed the rest of the Earth. 

So they think.

Hybrid Mika Smith has his doubts about everything, even about his sister Ellie’s suspicious death. But when a mysterious dream, a podship competition, and The Roar come into play, Mika must prepare to rethink everything he has ever known about the dying and corrupted world he lives in. 

One quote from the book really struck me: “A few people started riding bicycles and others reused their plastic bags and meanwhile Earth was gasping its last, desperate breath.” This quote really summarizes what the main idea of this book is. In this book, the Earth has been polluted beyond recognition, and humanity is desperately warring against nature, believing that only one can survive. This quote is gripping on an intrinsic level, making us question the validity of our motives, however well-intentioned they may be, and raises an inquiry into the basic human nature of greed and power. It stresses the need for substantial action and unity against some of the pressing problems facing our world.

The Roar by Emma Clayton is one of the best books I have ever read. The plot is just interesting enough to not be boring but suspenseful enough to be a nail-biting thriller. Although the plot is a bit too slow at times, the book still remains an excellent read. Emma Clayton has created a fictional masterpiece but added perfect undercurrents of real issues like climate change that pressure us all today.

-Vaidehi B.