EXCERPT:
Dr.
Doomsday’s Guide to Ultimate Survival
Rule
One: Always be prepared.
I
exhale in relief when MacKenna pulls the car into the Halliwell’s
Market parking lot. Because of the Sugar Sales Permit waiting list,
old stores like these are the only places that carry Extra Jolt soda.
I have to buy it myself, because Mom won’t keep any in the house.
She
thinks too much caffeine rots your brain or something. Halliwell’s
is a squat brown building that sits across the street from the mall
and is next door to the town’s only skyscraper.
The
First Federal Building was supposed to be the first piece of a
suburban business district designed to rival the hip boroughs of New
York. The mayor announced the construction of a movie theater, an
apartment complex and an indoor aquarium. But the New Depression hit,
and the other buildings never materialized.
The
First Federal Building alone soars toward the clouds, an ugly glass
rectangle visible from every neighborhood, surrounded by the old town
shops that have been there forever. Most of the stores are empty.
We
park in front of the market.
Our
car nestles in the long shadow of the giant bank building.
Charles
gets out and stands on the sidewalk in front of the car.
MacKenna
opens her door. She hesitates again. “Listen, I know you might not
want to hear this or believe it. But my book report wasn’t about
hurting you or getting revenge. I’m trying to get you to see what’s
really happening here. That Carver’s election is the start of
something bad. We could use you at the rally. You’re one of the few
people who understands Dr. Doomsday’s work. You could explain what
he did. How he helped Carver cheat to win.”
“I’ve
been planning this raid for months,” I say. My stomach churns,
sending uncomfortable flutters through my insides. I don’t know
what it would mean to talk about my father’s work. What I really
want to do is pretend it doesn’t exist. Pretend the world is normal
and whole.
I
reassure myself with the reminder that there’s no way MacKenna is
going to the rally either.
Out
of the corner of my eye, I see Charles give us a small wave. Before
MacKenna can say anything else, I get out and grab my backpack.
Inside
Halliwell’s, I pick up a blue basket from the stack near the door.
The small market is busy and full of other people shopping after
school or work. The smell of pine cleaner hits me as we pass the
checkout stations. They are super serious about germs and always
cleaning between customers.
I
leave MacKenna and Charles at the Click N’Grow rack near the door
to check out the seed packets that my brother collects. Dad got
Charles hooked on this computerized gardening that uses an e-tablet
and a series of tiny indoor lights to create the ideal indoor planter
box. Each week, they release a new set of exclusive seeds. Their
genetic modifications are controversial.
All
the soda is in large coolers that line one of the walls of the
market. They keep the strange stuff in the corner. Expensive root
beers. Ramune imported from Japan. And! Extra! Jolt! I put a few
bottles of strawberry in my basket. I snag some grape too. For a
second, I consider buying a couple of bottles of doughnut flavor. But
that sounds like too much, even for me. The chips are in the next
aisle. I load up on cheese puffs and spicy nacho crisps.
MacKenna
and Charles are still at the rack near the door, and I try to squeeze
by them without attracting any notice. I usually don’t buy
unhealthy snacks when I’m with my brother. I smuggle them in my
backpack and have a special hiding space in my desk.
My
brother has type 1 diabetes, and he’s supposed to check his blood
sugar after meals. He can have starchy or sugary snacks only when his
glucose level is good or on special occasions.
MacKenna
grimaces at a packet of seeds in her hands. “I still don’t like
this one. It’s pretty. But still. It’s…carnivorous.”
I
have to hand it to her. She really does have a
look. She’s
pale and white, like me, but she manages to seem like she’s doing
it on purpose and not because she’s some kind of vampire- movie
reject. Her glossy black hair always rests in perfect waves, and if
the journalism thing doesn’t work out, she could definitely have a
career in fashion design.
Charles
smiles at her. “It’s a new kind of pitcher plant. Like the Cobra
Lily.” He points to the picture on the front of the seed packet.
“Look at the blue flowers. That’s new.”
“It eats other plants,”
MacKenna says.
“You
eat plants.”
“But
I don’t eat people,” MacKenna says. “There’s got to be some
kind of natural law that says you shouldn’t eat your own kind.”
Charles
giggles.
So
far so good. Until.
My
brother trots up behind me and dumps a few packs of seeds in my
basket. His gaze lands on my selection of soda and chips. “Can I
get some snacks too?”
Crap.
I freeze. “What’s your
number?”
Charles
pretends he can’t hear me. That’s not a good sign.
“Charles,
what’s your number?”
He
still doesn’t look at me. “I forgot my monitor today.”
“Well,
I have mine.” I kneel down and dig around for the spare glucometer
I keep in the front pocket of my backpack. By the time I get it out,
MacKenna has already pulled Charles out of his blazer and rolled up
the sleeve of his blue dress shirt. I wave the device over the small
white sensor disk attached to my brother’s upper arm.
After
a few seconds, the glucometer beeps and a number displays on the
screen.
221
Crap.
Crap. Crap.
“Charles!
What did you eat today?”
My
brother’s face turns red. “They were having breakfast-for-lunch
day at school. Everyone else was having pancakes. Why can’t I have
pancakes?”
I
sigh. Something about his puckered up little face keeps me from
reminding him that if he eats too much sugar he could die. “You
know what Mom said. If you eat something you’re not supposed to,
you have to get a pass and go to the nurse for your meds.”
My
brother’s shoulders slump. “I couldn’t go to the nurse.
Hummingbirds were visiting the Chuparosa and…”
Charles
is on the verge of tears and frowns even more deeply at the sight of
my basket full of junk food.
“Look,”
I say. “There are plenty of healthy snacks we can eat. I’ll put
this stuff back.”
“That’s
right,” MacKenna says, giving Charles’s hand a squeeze. “We can
get some popcorn. Yogurt. Um, I saw some really delicious-looking
fresh pears back there.”
“And
they have the cheese cubes you like,” I add.
We
go around the store replacing the cheese puffs and soda with healthy
stuff. I hesitate when I have to put back the Extra Jolt, but I
really don’t want to make my brother feel bad because I can drink
sugary stuff and he can’t.
We
pay for the healthy snacks and the seed packets.
I grab the bags and move
toward the market’s sliding doors.
I
end up ahead of them, waiting outside by the car and facing the
store. The shopping center behind Halliwell’s is mostly empty. The
shoe store went out of business last year. Strauss Stationers, where
everyone used to buy their fancy wedding invitations, closed two
years before that. The fish ’n’ chips drive-through is doing okay
and has a little crowd in front of the take-out window. Way off in
the distance, Saba’s is still open, because in Arizona, cowboy
boots and hats aren’t considered optional.
I
watch MacKenna and Charles step out of the double doors and into the
parking lot. Two little dimples appear on MacKenna’s cheeks when
she smiles. Charles has a looseness to his walk. His arms dangle.
There’s
a low rumble, like thunder from a storm that couldn’t possibly
exist on this perfectly sunny day.
Something’s
wrong
In
the reflection of the market’s high, shiny windows, I see something
happening in the bank building next door. Some kind of fire burning
in the lower levels. A pain builds in my chest and I force air into
my lungs. My vision blurs at the edges. It’s panic, and there isn’t
much time before it overtakes me.
The
muscles in my legs tense and I take off at a sprint, grabbing
MacKenna and Charles as I pass. I haul them along with me twenty feet
or so into the store. We clear the door and run past a man and a
woman frozen at the sight of what’s going on across the street.
I
desperately want to look back.
But
I don’t.
A
scream.
A
low, loud boom.
My
ears ring.
The
lights in the store go off.
I’ve
got MacKenna by the strap of her maxidress and Charles by the neck.
We feel our way in the dim light. The three of us crouch and huddle
together behind a cash counter. A few feet in front of us, the
cashier who checked us out two minutes ago is sitting on the floor
hugging her knees.
We’re
going to die.
Charles’s
mouth is wide-open. His lips move. He pulls at the sleeve of my
T-shirt.
I
can’t hear anything.
It
takes everything I’ve got to force myself to move.
Slowly
Slowly
Leaning
forward. Pressing my face into the plywood of the store counter, I
peek around the corner using one eye to see out the glass door. My
eyelashes brush against the rough wood, and I grip the edge to steady
myself. I take in the smell of wood glue with each breath.
Hail
falls in the parking lot. I realize it’s glass.
My
stomach twists into a hard knot.
It’s
raining glass.
That’s
the last thing I see before a wave of dust rolls over the building.
Leaving
us in darkness.
Excerpted
from Day Zero by Kelly deVos, Copyright © 2019 by Kelly deVos.
Published by Inkyard Press.
Review: 5 Stars!
DAY ZERO is fascinating! I've been devoted to Apocalyptic and Post-Apocalyptic genres since I devoured Philip Wylie's TOMORROW at the age of ten and was rendered permanently terrified. DAY ZERO has been compared to Susan Beth Pfeffer's LIFE AS WE KNOW IT Series, but I am pleasantly reminded of Emmy Laybourne's MONUMENT 14. Two siblings (one diabetic and likely Asperger's) and their stepsister; teacher mom; emotionally distant stepdad; and prepper-survivalist dad--in a world suddenly erupting in inexplicable violence, anarchy, and chaos. Tell me: what is there NOT to love?
Absorbing in-the-midst-of-Apocalypse Dystopiana: find it right here. It is Day Zero, indeed.
Book Info:
DAY
ZERO
Author:
Kelly deVos
ISBN:
978-1335008480
Publication
Date: 11/12/19
Publisher:
Inkyard Press
Buy
Links:
Social
Links:
Author Bio:
KELLY
DEVOS
is from Gilbert, Arizona, where she lives with her high school
sweetheart husband, amazing teen daughter and superhero dog, Cocoa.
She holds a B.A. in Creative Writing from Arizona State University.
When not reading or writing, Kelly can typically be found with a
mocha in hand, bingeing the latest TV shows and adding to her
ever-growing sticker collection. Her debut novel, Fat Girl on a
Plane, named one of the "50 Best Summer Reads of All Time"
by Reader's Digest magazine, is available now from
HarperCollins.
Kelly's work has been featured in the New York
Times as well as on Salon, Vulture and Bustle.
Book
Summary:
Don’t
miss the exhilarating new novel from the author of Fat
Girl on a Plane,
featuring a fierce, bold heroine who will fight for her family and do
whatever it takes to survive. Fans of Susan Beth Pfeffer’s Life As
We Knew It series and Rick Yancey’s The 5th Wave series will cheer
for this fast-paced, near-future thrill ride.
If
you’re going through hell…keep going.
Seventeen-year-old
coder Jinx Marshall grew up spending weekends drilling with her
paranoid dad for a doomsday she’s sure will never come. She’s an
expert on self-heating meal rations, Krav Maga and extracting water
from a barrel cactus. Now that her parents are divorced, she’s
ready to relax. Her big plans include making it to level 99 in her
favorite MMORPG and spending the weekend with her new hunky
stepbrother, Toby.
But all that disaster training comes in
handy when an explosion traps her in a burning building. Stuck
leading her headstrong stepsister, MacKenna, and her precocious
little brother, Charles, to safety, Jinx gets them out alive only to
discover the explosion is part of a pattern of violence erupting all
over the country. Even worse, Jinx’s dad stands accused of
triggering the chaos.
In a desperate attempt to evade
paramilitary forces and vigilantes, Jinx and her siblings find Toby
and make a break for Mexico. With seemingly the whole world working
against them, they’ve got to get along and search for the truth
about the attacks—and about each other. But if they can survive,
will there be anything left worth surviving for?
