Annihilation by K.D. McAdams
Told from the perspective on a teen-aged boy who harbors a physicist deep within him, this post-apocalyptic tale stems from the premise that almost everyone has died from a fast-spreading ‘killer cold’. Somehow, Seamus and his New Hampshire based family have survived – thanks to his mother who is currently attending a scientific conference in San Diego. When Seamus’s father decides to pack up the kids (there are two more besides Seamus) and set out for San Diego they run into people and events that make their trip more difficult. At last the family is reunited but that is where the set up for Book 2 takes over.
I found Annihilation to be a well-written, fast moving story. I liked the protagonist being a teen-aged boy who is torn from his basement lab where he lives to work on his physics project; he is thrust into those social situations that his father has been telling him he needs to experience to live in the real world. Not only is Seamus thrust into the real world but he is quickly thrust into the role of adult when he steps in to help his father during their trip westward. We are given enough information about the characters in the Robinson family to flesh them out but not to make them complex. The action is always moving in the right direction to bring the reader to the story’s end.
I enjoyed this book immensely. It is well-written and imaginative. I look forward to reading the second in the series.
Suitable for all ages.
