A shadow has fallen over New City. It comes
shrouded in stealth and insidious manipulation. Future World Solutions claim to
be building a better world for the young people with renewable, solar systems
and robotics. All the rescue eagles are been replaced by robot look-alikes.
Human-identical robots are being programmed to act as subservient people.
Sneddon, believed dead, returns incognito. His now refined
and respectable image backed by wealth and power, masks the emotional cauldron
that boils within him. Ambitious and uncompromising, he now totally controls
the weather patterns.
Jeremiah, the climatologist and children’s guardian, has lost his job at the Bureau. After being accused of not foreseeing the mysterious out-of-control weather snaps that brings with them cold and sickness, he now lives in squalor. Isabella, Griffin, and Xavier are forced to move from his home into the mansion where Aleksander, the mysterious new boy at their elite school resides supported by an unknown patron.
A woman appears claiming to be Isabella’s lost
mother. Isabella accepts her unconditionally. But is she really who she says
she is?
All these shifts from the normality of the
children’s lives stem from one agenda. There is an obvious flux in the story as
well, in sync with the change of weather and its destructive force - pressure
exerted by Sneddon on the climate.
Isabella is drugged and kidnapped and again finds
herself trapped in flooded Grimsdon facing another tsunami. Is this the end for
Isabella this time?
The lead character Isabella is outstanding. She is
indomitable, strong, smart and courageous. The secondary characters’ individual
gifts complement Isabella’s strength of character and reveal all that they are
when together. They are emotionally, tightly bound to one another due to their
shared experiences. This is the issue that propels the story. The end brings a
surprising and unexpected twist.
The third book in the trilogy, Final Storm is a novel full of action and adventure. I regret not having read the former two
titles, Grimsdon and New City, as I would have enjoyed the connecting
continuity to this story.
Deborah Abela has created a powerful series that
expresses hers and most people’s underlying concerns regarding the lack of immediate
action toward climate change. It also demands strong attention to the
increasing introduction of robotics which carries with it, the slow but
definite dissolution of human capacity.
Title: Final Storm
Author: Deborah Abela
Publisher: Penguin, $16.99
Publication Date: August 2019
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9780143794462
For ages: 8 – 12
Type: Middle Grade Fiction
