Booklog 19/2021: N.M. Browne: Bad Water

[jacey]

A dystopian young adult book set somewhere in Britain's future after the rise of the sea levels and the inundation of the land. Ollu is a barger who sails a matriarch boat, The Ark, with her mother and, as the story opens, a pair of newly born twins, Ollu's new siblings. Unfortunately Mum as going downhill fast with childbed fever. There's not much modern medicine in this world, barely a few scraps and remnants, though there is a significant amount of old tekk which can be salvaged. (Some of it is still in use, though not really understood.) Ollu has to leave her mother and the babies in the hands of people she doesn't really trust in order to sail the river and bring back weapons to trade for her mother's treatment.

Buzz is travelling in the flying machine his father built, but a disastous crash landing kills his father and leaves Buzz, stranded, trying to finish their quest to find the Queen B, a comp that their own comp, the General, managed to make contact with briefly. Buzz has been gen-engineered to mesh with mashines and so he's drawn to Ollu's barge. He's captured by slavers and barely manages to escape along with Ratter, a child who sees the future in fitful visions/ Ratter has seen Buzz Olly and himself braided - only together will they survive.

This is an engaging book with good characters. Ollu is tough, yet vulnerable. She makes decisions in the best interests of her family, not always good ones, but she recovers from the bad ones. Buzz is big and strong with amazing tech skills, but he doesn't see himself as a leader. Ratter is fearless - perhaps too fearless. A thoroughly engrossing book with a vision of the future that would scare the pants off you and me, but our characters know nothing else, so they get on with making things better if they can.