it's the winter of 1997 in the town of demise, north dakota, and realene is already having a pretty shit time of things - her father's death, her mother's early onset alzheimer's, her plans of going to college in arizona being shattered. now, after a meteor crashes in the field across from her trailer park, she also finds herself trying to save the entire town from initially, a horde of vicious prairie dogs, which quickly escalates into multiple hordes of vicious.. everything.
yoooo!!! this was GREAT! i LOVED this! psa - there was A LOT of animal death/violence and there was recurring mention/description of child abuse, so please be cautious if that kind of content is upsetting for you. it was upsetting to me, but it wasn't intense enough for me to want to stop reading, personally. just from the summary, i went into this thinking it would be a fun, absurd little scifi horror jaunt, and it was, but it was also MUCH more intense than i was expecting. the stakes felt real, the violence was fucked up, the long lasting effects and loss in the aftermath were not downplayed. there were tons of funny moments and a lot of things that i, as someone who grew up in south dakota in the 90s, found charmingly relatable. this is a young adult book about a bizarre and preposterous situation, but the themes and the protag are incredibly mature. this was so fucking well done. also, bisexual protag!
highly recommend - 🦷🦷🦷🦷🦷