Thursday, December 22, 2011

The Future of Us

The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler (NY:  Razorbill, 2011).

Josh and Emma are best friends and neighbors; at least until six months ago when Josh almost acted on his more-than-Platonic feelings and things got awkward.  Emma is serial dating and Josh is still embarrassed, but he brings Emma the AOL CD-ROM he gets in the mail for her to load onto her new computer.  Dial-up is slow, but they get on the Internet and find...Facebook.  They've never heard of it because it's 1996, yet they quickly discern that they're looking at the future: their future--and everyone else's they care to look up.  That's weird enough, but then they notice that their future changes every time they log on, and they start to think about how the present ripples into the future at the same time as what they're seeing in the future is impacting their present lives.

This is such a wonderful premise, brimming with possibility, and Asher and Mackler do a great job of working with that potential.  The perspective switches off between Josh (Asher) and Emma (Mackler) but the transitions are seamless and there's no confusion. Seeing how Josh and Emma handle their new knowledge and ponder the ramifications of their actions--which they see played out in real time whenever they log in--makes the pages fly.  Highly recommended for ages 13 & up.  Sexual situations, alcohol.

1 comment:

Sara (of the Page Sage) said...

I really want to read this. I mean, Jay Asher wrote it! (: Thanks for the review (: