I\u2019ve read Butler\u2019s phenomenal sci-fi short story collection Bloodchild<\/em>, but this is the first time I\u2019ve dived into one of her novels. It\u2019s about a California slowly being devastated by climate change, where society is breaking down daily, just slowly enough that people can stay in denial. A teenage girl in a relatively-privileged multiracial gated community is the only one who will admit that the future will be murder; she plans for emergencies and begins to craft a new religion whose fundamental principle is, God is Change<\/em>.<\/p>\n The first hundred pages or so were very hard to get through. Lauren Oya Olamina, our narrator, was really<\/em> hard for me to take. She\u2019s a stereotypical teen in many ways. She judges everyone around her with the harshness of someone who\u2019s never had to admit serious fault. Like all teens in YA these days, she\u2019s put-upon and constantly hurt through no fault of her own. In Lauren\u2019s case it\u2019s because she has a medical condition which causes her to feel \u201chyperempathy\u201d: If she thinks you\u2019re hurting, she\u2019ll feel what she believes you feel. I\u2026 I hope it was ironic on purpose that this constantly judgmental character thinks her big problem is that she has too much<\/em> empathy? Anyway I was pretty sure that the narrative would teach her some hard lessons, and I trusted Butler, so I stuck it out.<\/p>\n I\u2019m glad I did. Lauren did get a bit easier to take as she made mistakes (though never big ones\u2013I really wish Butler had let her fail more) and learned to listen to others. She\u2019s still deeply no-fun. I did think of Butler as a grim writer, but not as a humorless one, so I was surprised at how humorless POTS<\/em> is. Virtually every time anybody laughs in this novel, they\u2019re laughing at the narrator! I\u2019m so glad I\u2019m not an adolescent anymore.<\/p>\n The supporting characters are much more memorable for their situations and backstories than for their personalities; Lauren\u2019s love interest is condescending in a mansplaining way which was realistic but, again, fun-free.<\/p>\n But the thing which kept me reading was the vivid portrayal of the collapsing society. All the details of Lauren\u2019s quest for survival\u2013and, eventually, community\u2013are so persuasive and brutal. The book becomes suspenseful once she leaves home, and I gnawed through the last half of it eagerly. There\u2019s a sequel and I\u2019m definitely planning to read that, even though lots of things about this book didn\u2019t really work for me.<\/p>\n The religion\u2026 ah, I\u2019m not the audience for this. Everything Lauren believes is plausible and I could see it being helpful to someone in a bad situation. \u201cGod is Change\u201d is plausible. It\u2019s also vastly less weird\u2013and therefore, from my pov, less compelling\u2013than, \u201cGod is a homeless virgin criminal, executed by the state and risen from the grave.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0