This book was first recommended to me by a librarian and then by my brother, so I read it in December 2022, enjoyed it, started to review it, and never got around to finishing the review. Now I reread it in December 2023 and finally finished my review. It only took me a year!
Dry by Neal Shusterman is a dystopian thriller set in California during a massive drought called the “Tap-Out” where there is no running water. People are fighting over water and resources, sometimes even forming massive mobs and killing people so they can have their water. The plot follows the story of 5 kids, ranging in age from 10 to 19, 10 year old Garret, his older sister Alyssa (16), their neighbor Kelton (16), Jacqui (19), and Henry (13-14) who they meet along their way in search of water and family.
To be honest, this book was quite scary. It’s the type of dystopian that seems realistic, rather than the more sci-fi-esque dystopian which isn’t as scary since it doesn’t hit as close to home. Overall, this book had a good balance of the characters being handed everything on a silver platter and them being in bad situations, or loosing hope (it has a lot more of the latter, which helps keep it interesting). Even reading it the second time, it was still good and unpredictable (since I didn’t remember everything that happened, especially some of the big twists). It even made me trust my brother’s taste in books more than I used to and it put me on a streak where all I wanted to read was dystopian for months after (which is good, because it got me out of my mystery craze that had been going on for months). 5 stars, good book, thumbs up, etc.