Camp Zero

Camp Zero by Michelle Min Sterling (2023) 320 pages

I listened to the audiobook on Libby. There are three narrators because there are three main parts of the story. This science fiction story is a subgenre called cli-fi, which means it is science fiction in the near future dealing with climate disaster. The globe is warming, the southern part of the U.S. is having record heat waves and wildfires (sound familiar?). Those that survive are pushing north into the previously frozen tundra of Canada. If you ever wanted to spend more time with the Jezebels in The Handmaid's Tale, this story might be for you. The main part of the plot follows Rose and other young women, all named after flowers, who work as "Blooms" in a far North mining/construction camp. Then there is a privileged college grad who takes a teaching job at the camp. His rosy outlook is quickly brought down by the harsh conditions at the arctic location. Third, we meet the women soldiers working at a military meteorological research station in another camp up north. Things get desperate and gruesome at times, since there is no escape for many of the characters. I didn't love the way the three plots are tied together in the end, but the journey leading up to those last chapters was pretty entertaining.
 

Isaac's Storm

Isaac's Storm: a Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Storm in History by Erik Larson  323 pp.

In September of 1900 Galveston, Texas was hit by the deadliest hurricane on record - 6000 dead - and nearly wiped from the face of the earth. Larson used meticulous research to chronicle the events leading up to and the aftermath of the storm. The story focuses on Isaac Cline, a meteorologist for the U.S. Weather Bureau. Cline finds himself in a battle against the bureaucrats at the U.S. Weather Bureau while trying to save the people of Galveston including his own family. The prevailing belief at that time was that hurricanes always travel up the east coast and never across the Gulf of Mexico (tell that to New Orleans). Because of a refusal of the bureaucrats to share information with the weather service in Cuba, storm warnings were not raised until much too late. In fact, the Bureau denied Isaac's first request to issue such a storm warning. It was only when Galveston was completely unreachable via telegraph that the Bureau became concerned. The details of the storm's deadliness are shocking and heart wrenching. The loss of life made it necessary to burn the bodies that were strewn everywhere because burial was just not possible. Isaac lost his wife to the storm and his daughter was seriously injured. The diamond pinky ring on Cline's photo on the cover was his late wife's wedding ring. Larson does an excellent job of providing the human side to this story based on letters and other written accounts by survivors and witnesses.