Science Fiction
![Nick Fuller Googins - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B0BTYXX545.jpg)
The Great Transition: A Novel
For fans of Station Eleven and The Ministry for the Future, this richly imaginative, immersive, and "profound" (Alice Elliott Dark, author of Fellowship Point) novel is the electrifying story of a family in crisis that unfolds against the backdrop of our near future.
Emi Vargas, whose parents helped save the world, is tired of being told how lucky she is to have been born after the climate crisis. But following the public assassination of a dozen climate criminals, Emi's mother, Kristina, disappears as a possible suspect, and Emi's illusions of utopia are shattered. A determined Emi and her father, Larch, journey from their home in Nuuk, Greenland to New York City, now a lightly populated storm-surge outpost built from the ruins of the former metropolis. But they aren't the only ones looking for Kristina.
Thirty years earlier, Larch first came to New York with a team of volunteers to save the city from rising waters and torrential storms. Kristina was on the frontlines of a different battle, fighting massive wildfires that ravaged the western United States. They became part of a movement that changed the world-The Great Transition-forging a new society and finding each other in process.
Alternating between Emi's desperate search for her mother and a meticulously rendered, heart-stopping account of her parents' experiences during The Great Transition, this novel beautifully shows how our actions today determine our fate tomorrow. A triumphant debut, The Great Transition is a breathtaking rendering of our near future, told through the story of one family trying to protect each other and the place we all call home.
Emi Vargas, whose parents helped save the world, is tired of being told how lucky she is to have been born after the climate crisis. But following the public assassination of a dozen climate criminals, Emi's mother, Kristina, disappears as a possible suspect, and Emi's illusions of utopia are shattered. A determined Emi and her father, Larch, journey from their home in Nuuk, Greenland to New York City, now a lightly populated storm-surge outpost built from the ruins of the former metropolis. But they aren't the only ones looking for Kristina.
Thirty years earlier, Larch first came to New York with a team of volunteers to save the city from rising waters and torrential storms. Kristina was on the frontlines of a different battle, fighting massive wildfires that ravaged the western United States. They became part of a movement that changed the world-The Great Transition-forging a new society and finding each other in process.
Alternating between Emi's desperate search for her mother and a meticulously rendered, heart-stopping account of her parents' experiences during The Great Transition, this novel beautifully shows how our actions today determine our fate tomorrow. A triumphant debut, The Great Transition is a breathtaking rendering of our near future, told through the story of one family trying to protect each other and the place we all call home.
Editorial Reviews
Prologue
There was this big throwback craze at school that started on Cooperative Day with a band called U2. Cooperative Day is when all the major cooperatives make presentations in the auditorium to convince you to apply. PepsiCo was there, and Alibaba, and CareCorps (Juniors and Seniors), and Uniqlo and Public Safety and DisneyCo and MemeFeed and tons more. The day isn't so awful except it's on a Sunday and mandatory. It got me out of garden hours with my mom, but still, who wants to be at school on a weekend? But then Maddie Choi somehow got onto the network during the very first presentation-the Carbon Capture Cooperative was on stage-and she cast a song "Sunday Bloody Sunday" through the auditorium. It was hilarious. Maddie Choi was a hero-for the prank and for introducing us all to U2. I remember sitting in the auditorium, laughing, and then suddenly quiet with everyone as we were like, How come we've never heard anything this good before?
Overnight everyone became U2 obsessed. Lunch was a battle zone: either you ate on this side of the cafeteria because The Joshua Tree was the greatest album ever, or you ate over there because Unforgettable Fire was best. My basketball team warmed up to "Beautiful Day" before games. The only oldies I knew before then were Dolly Parton and Taylor Swift and Valerie June, because my dad said my grandmother used to listen to them. But now I became obsessed along with everyone else. The difference, however, was that to everyone else the oldies were a fad that ended like all fads end. For me though, it just keeps going and going.
I can pick almost any year before the Crisis and name the top hits around the world. I have them all memorized. I love oldies. Music recorded pre-Crisis sounds different. Better. More real. There were still huge problems back then. Obviously. Like the band U2 was from Ireland which had been colonized by England for basically 500 years. There was poverty and pandemics and like a thousand people owned everything on the planet. But nobody had any idea what was coming. Not really. It's hard to imagine what it must have felt like. I try. I pretend it's 1980 or 2010 or 1960 and we think everything is great and will continue being great forever. Not even thinking it-just assuming it. Maybe that's why their music was so good. And why I love it so much. I can slip on my headphones and turn up Madonna or Beyoncé or Prince and pretend that nothing bad is ever going to happen again.
Part One
Chapter One
There was this big throwback craze at school that started on Cooperative Day with a band called U2. Cooperative Day is when all the major cooperatives make presentations in the auditorium to convince you to apply. PepsiCo was there, and Alibaba, and CareCorps (Juniors and Seniors), and Uniqlo and Public Safety and DisneyCo and MemeFeed and tons more. The day isn't so awful except it's on a Sunday and mandatory. It got me out of garden hours with my mom, but still, who wants to be at school on a weekend? But then Maddie Choi somehow got onto the network during the very first presentation-the Carbon Capture Cooperative was on stage-and she cast a song "Sunday Bloody Sunday" through the auditorium. It was hilarious. Maddie Choi was a hero-for the prank and for introducing us all to U2. I remember sitting in the auditorium, laughing, and then suddenly quiet with everyone as we were like, How come we've never heard anything this good before?
Overnight everyone became U2 obsessed. Lunch was a battle zone: either you ate on this side of the cafeteria because The Joshua Tree was the greatest album ever, or you ate over there because Unforgettable Fire was best. My basketball team warmed up to "Beautiful Day" before games. The only oldies I knew before then were Dolly Parton and Taylor Swift and Valerie June, because my dad said my grandmother used to listen to them. But now I became obsessed along with everyone else. The difference, however, was that to everyone else the oldies were a fad that ended like all fads end. For me though, it just keeps going and going.
I can pick almost any year before the Crisis and name the top hits around the world. I have them all memorized. I love oldies. Music recorded pre-Crisis sounds different. Better. More real. There were still huge problems back then. Obviously. Like the band U2 was from Ireland which had been colonized by England for basically 500 years. There was poverty and pandemics and like a thousand people owned everything on the planet. But nobody had any idea what was coming. Not really. It's hard to imagine what it must have felt like. I try. I pretend it's 1980 or 2010 or 1960 and we think everything is great and will continue being great forever. Not even thinking it-just assuming it. Maybe that's why their music was so good. And why I love it so much. I can slip on my headphones and turn up Madonna or Beyoncé or Prince and pretend that nothing bad is ever going to happen again.
Part One
Chapter One
Short Excerpt Teaser
Prologue
There was this big throwback craze at school that started on Cooperative Day with a band called U2. Cooperative Day is when all the major cooperatives make presentations in the auditorium to convince you to apply. PepsiCo was there, and Alibaba, and CareCorps (Juniors and Seniors), and Uniqlo and Public Safety and DisneyCo and MemeFeed and tons more. The day isn't so awful except it's on a Sunday and mandatory. It got me out of garden hours with my mom, but still, who wants to be at school on a weekend? But then Maddie Choi somehow got onto the network during the very first presentation-the Carbon Capture Cooperative was on stage-and she cast a song "Sunday Bloody Sunday" through the auditorium. It was hilarious. Maddie Choi was a hero-for the prank and for introducing us all to U2. I remember sitting in the auditorium, laughing, and then suddenly quiet with everyone as we were like, How come we've never heard anything this good before?
Overnight everyone became U2 obsessed. Lunch was a battle zone: either you ate on this side of the cafeteria because The Joshua Tree was the greatest album ever, or you ate over there because Unforgettable Fire was best. My basketball team warmed up to "Beautiful Day" before games. The only oldies I knew before then were Dolly Parton and Taylor Swift and Valerie June, because my dad said my grandmother used to listen to them. But now I became obsessed along with everyone else. The difference, however, was that to everyone else the oldies were a fad that ended like all fads end. For me though, it just keeps going and going.
I can pick almost any year before the Crisis and name the top hits around the world. I have them all memorized. I love oldies. Music recorded pre-Crisis sounds different. Better. More real. There were still huge problems back then. Obviously. Like the band U2 was from Ireland which had been colonized by England for basically 500 years. There was poverty and pandemics and like a thousand people owned everything on the planet. But nobody had any idea what was coming. Not really. It's hard to imagine what it must have felt like. I try. I pretend it's 1980 or 2010 or 1960 and we think everything is great and will continue being great forever. Not even thinking it-just assuming it. Maybe that's why their music was so good. And why I love it so much. I can slip on my headphones and turn up Madonna or Beyoncé or Prince and pretend that nothing bad is ever going to happen again.
Part One
Chapter One
The day before my mom leaves for extraction duty, she's not herself. She doesn't wake me early. She doesn't force us to jog upcity together. Instead, she makes breakfast. I smell it before I see it: egg tacos, sweet potato hash, warm cinnamon milk with honey. She has her screen on the counter streaming something upbeat and bland, and she's smiling-practically singing good morning-as she pulls out chairs for us to sit.
My dad and I throw each other looks like, Do you know this woman?
My dad's always the one who makes breakfast. Also lunch and dinner. It's always been this way. He's a team nutritionist for the Tundra and he's really good at his job, even if I don't always eat what he cooks. When I don't eat, my mom will say I'm spoiled, or picky or ungrateful, or accuse me of being difficult on purpose. But I'm not. Sometimes I just don't want to eat. Sometimes I can't. Even when she tells me I must eat so many bites, like I'm a little kid. She'll ask if I have any idea how lucky I am, not to know real hunger? She'll lose her temper. She'll ignite. She's most predictable in this way.
Other ways to ignite my mom:
Tell her you want a cat.
Tell her you want your own screen.
Tell her you hate getting up early.
Tell her you wish you lived somewhere less crowded than Nuuk.
Tell her school is stressful.
Tell her that Sundays aren't meant for sifting compost in the plaza garden.
Tell her you're scared of choking on your food.
Tell her that you're scared of anything at all.
But the day before she leaves for extraction duty, the sparks bounce off her. She won't ignite. When I take one sip of milk and push back my plate, she just smiles and says, Maybe later.
I look at my dad while she scrapes my tacos into the compost.
He shrugs like: I'm not complaining.
There was this big throwback craze at school that started on Cooperative Day with a band called U2. Cooperative Day is when all the major cooperatives make presentations in the auditorium to convince you to apply. PepsiCo was there, and Alibaba, and CareCorps (Juniors and Seniors), and Uniqlo and Public Safety and DisneyCo and MemeFeed and tons more. The day isn't so awful except it's on a Sunday and mandatory. It got me out of garden hours with my mom, but still, who wants to be at school on a weekend? But then Maddie Choi somehow got onto the network during the very first presentation-the Carbon Capture Cooperative was on stage-and she cast a song "Sunday Bloody Sunday" through the auditorium. It was hilarious. Maddie Choi was a hero-for the prank and for introducing us all to U2. I remember sitting in the auditorium, laughing, and then suddenly quiet with everyone as we were like, How come we've never heard anything this good before?
Overnight everyone became U2 obsessed. Lunch was a battle zone: either you ate on this side of the cafeteria because The Joshua Tree was the greatest album ever, or you ate over there because Unforgettable Fire was best. My basketball team warmed up to "Beautiful Day" before games. The only oldies I knew before then were Dolly Parton and Taylor Swift and Valerie June, because my dad said my grandmother used to listen to them. But now I became obsessed along with everyone else. The difference, however, was that to everyone else the oldies were a fad that ended like all fads end. For me though, it just keeps going and going.
I can pick almost any year before the Crisis and name the top hits around the world. I have them all memorized. I love oldies. Music recorded pre-Crisis sounds different. Better. More real. There were still huge problems back then. Obviously. Like the band U2 was from Ireland which had been colonized by England for basically 500 years. There was poverty and pandemics and like a thousand people owned everything on the planet. But nobody had any idea what was coming. Not really. It's hard to imagine what it must have felt like. I try. I pretend it's 1980 or 2010 or 1960 and we think everything is great and will continue being great forever. Not even thinking it-just assuming it. Maybe that's why their music was so good. And why I love it so much. I can slip on my headphones and turn up Madonna or Beyoncé or Prince and pretend that nothing bad is ever going to happen again.
Part One
Chapter One
The day before my mom leaves for extraction duty, she's not herself. She doesn't wake me early. She doesn't force us to jog upcity together. Instead, she makes breakfast. I smell it before I see it: egg tacos, sweet potato hash, warm cinnamon milk with honey. She has her screen on the counter streaming something upbeat and bland, and she's smiling-practically singing good morning-as she pulls out chairs for us to sit.
My dad and I throw each other looks like, Do you know this woman?
My dad's always the one who makes breakfast. Also lunch and dinner. It's always been this way. He's a team nutritionist for the Tundra and he's really good at his job, even if I don't always eat what he cooks. When I don't eat, my mom will say I'm spoiled, or picky or ungrateful, or accuse me of being difficult on purpose. But I'm not. Sometimes I just don't want to eat. Sometimes I can't. Even when she tells me I must eat so many bites, like I'm a little kid. She'll ask if I have any idea how lucky I am, not to know real hunger? She'll lose her temper. She'll ignite. She's most predictable in this way.
Other ways to ignite my mom:
Tell her you want a cat.
Tell her you want your own screen.
Tell her you hate getting up early.
Tell her you wish you lived somewhere less crowded than Nuuk.
Tell her school is stressful.
Tell her that Sundays aren't meant for sifting compost in the plaza garden.
Tell her you're scared of choking on your food.
Tell her that you're scared of anything at all.
But the day before she leaves for extraction duty, the sparks bounce off her. She won't ignite. When I take one sip of milk and push back my plate, she just smiles and says, Maybe later.
I look at my dad while she scrapes my tacos into the compost.
He shrugs like: I'm not complaining.
