Book Review: Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

Life As We Knew It, Susan Beth Pfeffer (2006)[****].  Trixie (12 years old, 6th grade) loved this story, and while I don't often read her books, this one seemed kind of fascinating and I was looking for a quick, easy read.  As it turns out, Life As We Knew It was all three.  Through her diary, sixteen year old Miranda tells the story of her family's survival in the aftermath of catastrophic natural disasters when an asteroid hits the moon and knocks it out of its orbit.  That's basically it:  lots of bad things happen to the world, and MIranda matures as she helps her family survive (barely) over the course of a long, cold, hungry winter.  While life gets pretty bleak for awhile, the true violence and depravity that would probably accompany such a catastrophe is toned down enough to make this appropriate for kids. Probably not the sort of book that most of you will put on your must-read list, but if you have avid tween or young teen readers in your life, they might like this.