Strange Exit by Parker Peevyhouse (review)
Buy Issue for $25 at JHUP- Strange Exit by Parker Peevyhouse
Peevyhouse, Parker Strange Exit. Tor Teen, 2020 [288p] Trade ed. ISBN 978-0-7653-9942-7 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-0-7653-9944-1 $9.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad Gr. 7-10
Earth has been destroyed by war, and a spaceship full of teenagers is looking for another inhabitable planet. On the long journey, they have access to the "sim," a simulated virtual reality of San Francisco, for recreation, but something's gone wrong and people are disappearing there. Lake seeks to save her fellow passengers from the sim, and she also hopes that if she can wake everyone, the spaceship they are on will be able to shut off the sim and avoid total energy depletion. Things get worse, though, when teenagers in the sim start attacking each other with a substance called "tar," black oozing stuff produced when there's an incongruity in people's brains that leads to incongruity in the simulation's code. This dystopian novel provides heady suspense in a fast-paced survival adventure that unfolds almost entirely inside the computer-enhanced minds of the characters. Unfortunately, the story undermines its own premise with a last-minute twist that pulls the carpet out from under the reader and wastes their emotional investment. Nevertheless, some will appreciate this mind-bending read about a bleak future and a journey into space.
