The Dead and the Gone (Last Survivors, #2) by Susan Beth Pfeffer

Oct 20, 2010 karen rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: the-end, why-yes-i-ya

it has come to this. last week, while waiting for more books to come up to shelve, i was idly wondering if this book had come out in paperback yet. it had. so i ran downstairs, pushing folks out of the way on the escalator and making a beeline for teen fiction where i whooped and grabbed a copy. ashamed of my excitement, i made my way back upstairs, trying to figure out how the mighty had fallen. (and by mighty, i mean only those vehemently opposed to adults who read teen fiction). now, i am onl...more it has come to this. last week, while waiting for more books to come up to shelve, i was idly wondering if this book had come out in paperback yet. it had. so i ran downstairs, pushing folks out of the way on the escalator and making a beeline for teen fiction where i whooped and grabbed a copy. ashamed of my excitement, i made my way back upstairs, trying to figure out how the mighty had fallen. (and by mighty, i mean only those vehemently opposed to adults who read teen fiction). now, i am only opposed to adults who read teen fiction exclusively. come find me in a year or two and see what is happening then.

but i thought this book would be worth a read. it is the second part of the series that describes what happens when an asteroid scootches the moon a little closer to us. tsunamis, volcanoes, panic, volcanic ash covering the sun, cold, starvation, more panic, crop death. the first one i thought was only eh. it was narrated by a kind of whiny white girl in pennsylvania suburbia. this one was supposed to have been narrated by a puerto rican teenager living in new york city! splendid, i thought - that's where i live! let's see what will happen here - maybe i can get some more end-of-world- pointers, just in case.

the problem is, these two characters are interchangeable. it's true, he will occasionally blurt out a spanish phrase in the middle of his speeches. but just cuz you know a little spanish, doesn't make you authentic (pingüino). just because dave chappelle wears whiteface he doesn't then become "white", just hilarious. and that's this book's problem. there are times when it is hilarious. for example: the main character, a hard-working, catholic-school-attending, second-in-his-class, doing-homework-after-the-apocalypse kind of kid- this kid doesn't know how to make macaroni because of the traditional gender roles of his ethnicity?? "it goes in a pot??" something about his complete helplessness doesn't ring true.

and mon dieu, don't get me started on the catholic thing. if i entered a church now, i would probably go up in flames, but i was indeed raised roman catholic.and i know catholics make for passive and somewhat wimpy heroes (although i saw book of eli yesterday, and that - while not being overall a great movie- had some serious badassery in it) and i totally understand the moral burden of catholicism, but this is survival, son... jesus would want you to have some canned goods. in the apocalypse, breaking into apartments from which the owners have fled is not stealing, it is persevering. you can only turn the other cheek and do unto others for so long, at some point you have to eat.

and i see these catholic school kids in the store after school lets out daily. and i assume we get the nerdiest of that population because who else would come to a bookstore to hang out, manga or no manga... but if we are getting the nerdiest of the batch, the kids in this book are not among them. the kids in this book do not exist in the parochial schools of new york. maybe rhode island - somewhere more sheltered and polite. maybe.

this is what kills me - the book is called "wrenchingly plausible" but it is in no way authentic-seeming, either in voice or occurrences. there are some scenes of mob-mentality, but it all seems like gentle-mall violence, not nyfc. and yes it is teen fiction, but so is hunger games, and that is masterful in its control of violence.

and they don't seem too resourceful anyway. after reading three of the brian boks by gary paulsen, i understand teen ingenuity. even though it is fiction, it has the ring of truth - his thought processes and trial-and-errors make sense. this kid doesn't seem like any urban 17-year-old i have come across in my workaday life (including the ones i shoved to get to this book), and his younger sisters are worse than useless.

THIS IS WHERE I MAY BE SPOILING SOMETHING IF YOU PLAN ON READING THIS BOOK SO BEWARE AND DO NOT CROSS THIS BARRIER.

i don't care how religious you are, you do not shake the hand of the man who offers to pimp out your sister and say "no hard feelings". dude! jesus would totally not be into that. he would allow you a little resentment. maybe a kick or two. as long as you repent...

also - unrelated to child-prostitution - the same "out" was used as was used in the first book, for one character, to be sent somewhere "better" for a time, if i am remembering correctly. boo-urns for repetition.

but i know that when the third book comes out, i will be pushing teen readers out of the way with a vengeance. and if the moon gets any closer, i will be breaking into your apartments to get at your canned beets. count on it. so stock up.

final word: eh.(less)

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Nov 07, 2011 Mark rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult, fantasy, dystopian

I enjoyed the first part in the series, Life as We Knew It, and thought retelling the events from a different perspective and then having the two mains meet up in the third was a smart way to handle the trilogy. But while the ideas were there, ultimately this book really lacks substance and feels like a poor version of the first one. There will be some SPOILERS - be forewarned.

Following Alex and his family who live in NYC, he must find a way to keep his family alive as they go through the catacl...more

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Jan 26, 2008 Claire Scott rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: ya

If I thought Life As We Knew It made me want to create the world's greatest emergency preparedness kit, it was nothing compared to The Dead and the Gone. This book scared the living daylights out of me. After begging a friend for the ARC, I had to put it down instead of reading it straight through in order to avoid nightmares.

Premise of both books: meteor hits moon, natural-disaster apocalypse ensues in the form of a collapsed infrastructure, food shortages, epidemics, etc. Life As We Knew It t...more

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Mar 12, 2011 Megan rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult, not-mine-library

The Dead and the Gone pretty much sums up this entire book. Everyone in NYC is either dead, gone or soon will be. Asteroid hits moon, earth goes through nasty changes, everyone dies, the end. But wait, you ask… what of the hard core survivalists? I’m sure they are out there somewhere, but they are certainly not in Susan Beth Pfeffer’s second book of her Last Survivors series. This is a shame, because this YA novel started off so good.

In The Dead and the Gone we follow the story of Alex Morales,...more The Dead and the Gone pretty much sums up this entire book. Everyone in NYC is either dead, gone or soon will be. Asteroid hits moon, earth goes through nasty changes, everyone dies, the end. But wait, you ask… what of the hard core survivalists? I’m sure they are out there somewhere, but they are certainly not in Susan Beth Pfeffer’s second book of her Last Survivors series. This is a shame, because this YA novel started off so good.

In The Dead and the Gone we follow the story of Alex Morales, a Puerto Rican teenager living in NYC. Although it will take you awhile to figure this out, everything you need to know about this kid can be learned from his last name. Morales: "Son of Moral," a given name meaning "right and proper." (per some random website about genealogy and surnames. What, internet research isn’t real research? =)) Anyway…. This kid has morals. And the strength of the Catholic Church. And a whole lot of problems that could have been avoided if only he wasn’t so ~~stupid~~ opposed to ~~looting~~ breaking and entering.

At some point while reading this book, I glanced at the back and noticed a blurb that said, “for ages twelve and up” and really, that is the real problem here. Pfeffer is writing for a very young audience, not the current older teen/young adult audience that is often aimed at these days. For all of the complex issues and situations presented in The Dead and the Gone, tough conversations are completed neatly and quickly, difficult situations are easily gotten out of, angsty things are not angstly dwelled upon. Rather than an age suggestion, this book sould have been given an “Apocalypse PG13” warning.

The first book in this series, Life As We Knew It was, despite its flaws, fantastic. So, I raised the bar a little for this one because the second should always be better than the first, right? Unfortunately, it wasn’t. It was just more of the same. Asteroid, starvation, flu so strong it causes delusions. Been there, done that. What makes this one worse is that Alex is presented as a poor kid who has to make his own fate in order to be successful. But he makes a lot of idiotic decisions and passes up fantastic opportunities because of pride and Catholicism. I’m a sucker, so I’ll read the third and final installment of this series. But I don’t recommend these books for adult readers of YA, unless of course you are looking for some serious fluffy brain candy ;)

Update 12/11/11 Having read, and been severely disappointed by author Susan Beth Pfeffer's Blood Wounds, I actually will not be continuing this series. I have learned that while this author is great at creating fucked up situations, her character development is nil. I'm moving on. (less)

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Aug 14, 2008 Lisa Vegan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: 12 & all the way up

Shelves: fiction, orphaned-and-quasi-orphaned-kids, reviewed, novel, young-adult, speculative-fiction

I enjoyed this book almost as much as the author’s companion book Life As We Knew It, which was a pleasant surprise as I did not expect to like it as much. It’s riveting.

The two books together make for very interesting reading as both detail what happens to different families during a natural disaster that causes the moon to move much closer to earth, causing cataclysmic changes.

This book differs in that it’s not told in diary form by a suburban middle class teenage girl but in third person fro...more

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Feb 26, 2008 Colleen Venable rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2008-read, ya-fiction

I'm so confused by these books! All the way through I complained and whined, the characters painfully unbelievable and about as dimensional as pancakes, but that said I could not stop reading. If I was making a single copy I brought the book to the copy machine. If I was in the elevator going up one floor, I threw my faces into these pages. I casually snuck paragraphs in between work e-mails, one eye on the ink one on the boss door. Pfeffer is an amazing concept writer, and the concept is what p...more

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Aug 26, 2012 Buggy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: end-of-days, ya, fiction, shelf-12, survival, horrors

Oh this was good, probably just as good as Life As We Knew It but the shock factor from that 1st book kind of knocks this one down a notch. This is a companion book to LAWKI, that’s right the same exact events from a different perspective. Here instead of reading from the diary of a girl in rural Pennsylvania we get the POV of a 17 year old boy in New York City as he also deals with the aftermath of an asteroid hitting the moon and knocking it out of its orbit. The same apocalyptic events follow...more Oh this was good, probably just as good as Life As We Knew It but the shock factor from that 1st book kind of knocks this one down a notch. This is a companion book to LAWKI, that’s right the same exact events from a different perspective. Here instead of reading from the diary of a girl in rural Pennsylvania we get the POV of a 17 year old boy in New York City as he also deals with the aftermath of an asteroid hitting the moon and knocking it out of its orbit. The same apocalyptic events follow; Tsunamis claim the coasts, volcanoes erupt, ash fills the sky, arctic winter sets in followed by food shortages, killer flues and starvation.

THE DEAD & THE GONE is equally as realistic and bone chilling as the first book, maybe even more so and also just as fascinating and unlookawayable. Even knowing the turn of events I was going to face this book still managed to shock me and mess with my head. Yup, the OCD is back too, stockpiling food and supplies just in case.

Family again plays a key role within this story as does religion, courage and personal sacrifice and there are couple of scenes in that regard that are going to stick with me for a long time. Like when Alex enters Yankee Stadium in the (hopes?) of identifying the body of his missing mother. This scene is terrifying; right from the militant aspect of him boarding the bus to get to the stadium through to the sounds Susan Beth Pfeffer describes inside. I can still hear the wailing, the buzz. And then there’s “body shopping” with his friend Kevin -amazing what becomes normal in an apocalyptic world. I can’t honestly say I was pleased with the ending, it just sort of well, ends without any resolutions or even a feeling of this is a good place to stop for a cliff hanger. I kept turning the page looking for more. Huh did I miss something? Other than that a fantastic, absorbing read.

17 year old Alex Morales is a junior in high school when cataclysmic events alter his life forever. Within hours of the asteroid hitting the moon his home of New York becomes an unfamiliar city. Panic sets in as the power and phones go out and Alex quickly realizes that with his father in Puerto Rico attending a funeral and his mother unreachable at her job at a hospital in Queens he is in charge of the care and safety of his two younger sisters. With news of subway floodings and worldwide tsunamis he also has no way of knowing if his parents are dead or alive. Waiting to hear of their fate just added another level of suspense to this story.

As summer turns to arctic winter the rich and influential abandon the city, leaving the poor to fend for themselves. Disease and starvation threatens those left behind, food becomes scarce, money no longer has any value and the barter system takes over, what can he trade to feed his sisters for another week? How many tins of food can he get for this watch, this coat, these shoes, this bottle of vodka. How much is this 10,000 dollar winning lottery ticket worth? (A tin of pineapple as it turns out) When his pretty and spirited 12 year old sister becomes something of value Alex has to find a way to get them out of New York at any cost.

318jb4.5(less)

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Mar 12, 2010 Ash rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'm reading these books in a weird order. I haven't read the first of these yet, Life As We Knew It, so I obviously can't compare the two. This was just...sad, but strangely life affirming.

Quick Overview:(I doubt anyone really needs this, but...) An asteroid has hit the moon and knocked it closer to the earth and therefore making everything go out of wack, causing disasters and extreme climate changes all over the world. Alex Morales lives in New York City. He's a hard-working Puerto Rican seve...more I'm reading these books in a weird order. I haven't read the first of these yet, Life As We Knew It, so I obviously can't compare the two. This was just...sad, but strangely life affirming.

Quick Overview:(I doubt anyone really needs this, but...) An asteroid has hit the moon and knocked it closer to the earth and therefore making everything go out of wack, causing disasters and extreme climate changes all over the world. Alex Morales lives in New York City. He's a hard-working Puerto Rican seventeen year-old whose main focus is to do good in school to get into a top notch college. After the asteroid strikes the moon though everything changes. At first Alex believes that the moon will be put back in its place and everything will be fixed, but he soon finds that things will never be normal again. He doesn't know what's happened to either of his parents. His mother, a nurse, has been missing since the day she was called to the hospital and his father went to Puerto Rico for a funeral. With Alex's older brother in the Marines he's the only one left to care for his younger sisters Julie and Brianna. New York soon turns into a wasteland and food is becoming more and more scarce. Alex just prays that he and his sisters can survive despite the death and starvation surrounding them.

This book absolutely depressed me. I became incredibly aware of how much food I had and ate, which is a lot. I have to admit that on some fronts this book was a little unrealistic. I hate sounding like the pessimist but I think that when people are desperate they’ll do anything to survive. It’s a little hard to think that in the midst of all the disease and starvation that people wouldn’t kill for food. Not that I wanted more suckage in this book, trust me there was a lot of that. I just think that some people would be more brutal. One thing that I do want to mention is this thing with the macaroni. Some reviews mentioned that it was incredibly stereotypical and unbelievable that Alex didn’t know how to make macaroni and cheese. I admit that the culture is a bit stereotyped. Coming from a Hispanic family my dad washed the dishes, my brother vacuums, and me and my sisters helped our dad dig trenches, not to mention that I can practically give a dissertation on the Cumming engine and Allison transmission. I can bet you money though that you give my brother a box of macaroni and he won’t have a clue what to do with it. Maybe put it in the microwave, cardboard and all. And he’s 16. I’m totally serious. What I did find to be a bit unbelievable is that Alex continues to go to school even before the benefit of food comes in.

Despite all that though I found that this book gives you a tiny feeling of hope in the midst of all tragedy happening. If I was younger I would absolutely hate this book but now I can appreciate the struggle that Alex and his sisters go through. I loved seeing how Julie grew from a whiny little girl into someone willing to sacrifice. She shows that she’s a lot stronger and tougher than you think. Although Brianna is a little fanatically religious I thought that the aspect of religion really added to the book because it is so important in Hispanic culture. Some parts are really sad and you think things just can’t get any worse for them, but there are also times when you see just how beautiful the little things are. Some might think that Alex is too perfect, but what's wrong with having a character who is good? Others will probably think that he’s doing everything wrong but I think it’s realistic that he would do what he thinks will most benefit his family. Even if it is ethically wrong.

Yes, this is a sad book. Towards the end I seriously started to get choked up. I’ve never cried from reading, but this was close. Although the end doesn’t give you a lot of resolution it gives you a thread of hope that will keep you satisfied enough until you get to read the next book. So overall a sad book, but it shows just how much we as people can endure and will sacrifice to live and save the people we love. (less)

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Apr 13, 2010 Jenn "Awww Yeaaahhh" rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: ya

This book is a companion piece to Life As We Knew It, and we get to see the same exact events (an asteroid knocks the moon closer to Earth which causes every kind of natural disaster) from a different perspective, this time from a Hispanic boy instead of a white girl, in NYC instead of a small Pennsylvanian town. Their experiences are different enough so that you're not constantly comparing the two even though you have an idea of what's going on.

One of the things I liked best about LAWKI was th...more This book is a companion piece to Life As We Knew It, and we get to see the same exact events (an asteroid knocks the moon closer to Earth which causes every kind of natural disaster) from a different perspective, this time from a Hispanic boy instead of a white girl, in NYC instead of a small Pennsylvanian town. Their experiences are different enough so that you're not constantly comparing the two even though you have an idea of what's going on.

One of the things I liked best about LAWKI was that the science seemed well researched and realistic. Since Pfeffer couldn't wow me with scientific speculations this time around, I had to focus more on the human element, and that fell a bit short when compared to it's predecessor. Seventeen year-old Alex Morales is Puerto Rican, Catholic, smart, serious and an overachiever. His parents are missing and presumed dead almost immediately, and he alone is left to care for his two younger teenaged sisters, Brianna and Julie. I like that he's resourceful and will do whatever it takes to feed his family, including jumping some ethical hurdles despite his strict religious beliefs. The rich and influential are able to get out of town, but the poor are left to fend for themselves and the Catholic church plays a powerful role in their survival, representing the moral center. (This strong moral belief comes into play in the third book.) But the church can't pull bread and fish out of thin air, so there are a lot of desperate, starving and sick people in the city. And this is where I stopped believing a little bit. Yes, Alex resorts to some morally questionable activities, but I just think that in a big, bad city things would get worse. A lot worse. Even if it wasn't Alex, there would be a lot of other people doing really bad things. Instead, people are calmly waiting in the free food line (save for the one riot we saw), law enforcement isn't an issue, and it's safe to walk the street as long as you have your big brother around. If you don't, a can of pineapples will suffice. Also, there is some ethnic stereotyping (apparently Hispanic males can't cook mararoni, even a potential future President of the United States, but they sure can yell at their little sister!) and one far-fetched plot point I didn't like, which is why wouldn't Alex, as super (his dad) of the building, have keys to the rest of the apartments?? Unlikely.

Besides all that, the story is still compelling and scary and bleak and hopeful, and if you liked the first one, you'll probably like this one as well.(less)

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Dec 03, 2011 Jianne rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: library-books

The Dead and the Gone has not made it up to my expectations especially after loving Life As We Knew It. I'll talk more about the problems that I found in the book rather than the ones I liked (which were fewer actually)

Alex Morales is a seventeen-year-old Puerto Rican New Yorker whose parents disappear in the aftermath of the tidal waves, must must now care for his two younger sisters, Julie and Brianna even when hope seems all gone.

The novel explores on how a young man takes on unimaginable res...more

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Feb 17, 2013 Book Concierge rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

After an asteroid knocks the moon out of its orbit and closer to the Earth, conditions in New York City quickly deteriorate. High school junior Alex Morales is unaware of what’s happened, but when he gets home from his job at the pizza parlor the electricity goes out. There he finds his two younger sisters alone in the apartment. Their father was out of town for a funeral. Their mother, like all medical personnel, had been called into work at the hospital. Thus begins their long ordeal, with Ale...more

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Feb 04, 2010 Sara rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: boys-y-a, girls-y-a, fantasy

Holy stinkin' cow! This book had me on the constant verge of a panic attack throughout the entire 308 pages! So, I don't do well with 'end of the world things,' and that is exactly what this book is about. However, it's an incredible read and has a quick-moving and captivating plot. I would recommend it to boys (especially) and girls over 14. [The author notes that the book is for 12+, but I think that some of the stuff in here would be too much for kids under 14. My 12 year old brother would st...more

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Jan 10, 2009 Ashley rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult

The Dead and the Gone is a strange move for an author and likely a disappointment for readers of Pfeffer’s Life as We Knew It. Described as a “companion novel” to Life as We Knew It, The Dead and the Gone provides no extension of the earlier novel; instead, we see (again) the crises of tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanic eruption, famine, and epidemic disease caused by the moon being knocked out of its orbit. This book covers roughly the same span of time and addresses many of the same issues—both...more

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Jun 13, 2008 Dave S. rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: people with twisted minds who like sad endings and corpses.

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jan 30, 2009 Lara rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I absolutely loved the first book in this two-book series, Life as We Knew it.

This one wasn't quite as captivating to me, but still very engaging. I was interested to see a different perspective on the entire disaster, and how differently it affected New York City than it did the small town portrayed in the first book. Mainly because in the first book the family was so isolated that the entire ordeal was about just them. The rest of the world could have been dead for all they knew. This book sh...more

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Jan 08, 2008 Rachel rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

We were lucky enough to get an advance readers copy of this book and wow....it was dark. But good! The story is set in the same time frame as the first book except the main character Alex, lives in New York City. There are obviously more people in NYC, so he sees a lot more death than Miranda did. They face some of the same problems...depleting food supplies, no electricity, and freezing temperatures, but Alex has a whole new set of problems not faced in the first book. How do you stay warm if y...more

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Jan 09, 2008 Karin rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: youngadult, 2008-reads

Companion Novel to Life As We Knew It by Susan Pfeffer. Release date: June 1, 2008

As is the problem in Life As We Knew It, the moon has been hit by a meteor and is knocked off of its axis. The moon is now closer to the Earth which sets off a chain reaction of natural disasters throughout the world. Alex Morales lives in New York City which is devastated right from the start. The Statue of Liberty has been wiped out and many people were washed out to sea by huge tidal waves caused because of the...more

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Jun 30, 2008 Hayden rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: apocalyptic, guy-book, latino, sci-fi, teen, tragedy, urban

If I had read this one first, I might have liked it better than Life As We Knew It. As it was, I was already hip to the premise: asteroid hits moon, knocking it into a closer orbit of earth and unleashing massive worldwide environmental devastation.

But unlike the first book, which was set in the burbs, this one is set in NYC, and told from the point of view of a Puerto Rican kid trying to look out for his two younger sisters in the absence (and likely deaths) of his parents and older brother. I...more

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Jul 16, 2008 Jess rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult

This companion to Life as We Knew It is much darker - perhaps because, even though this is set in a different place, the reader knows a little bit about what will happen. And, unlike the narrator in LAWKT, who is allowed to enjoy herself a little before things go downhill (and they always go down hill when the moon is pushed closer to the earth), Alex is thrown immediately into the horror of what has happened. This has the same tension as the first one, or perhaps more, and was just as difficult...more

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Dec 13, 2012 Scott5212 rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is really interesting. One of the cool things about it is that the book is non fiction, so the events that occur could be possible. I like how the way the protagonist is a little calm of the event, like if he knows if it´s going to be fixed.I haven't read the first book but I´m sure this book is better because the author a second opportunity to write this book. The only difference is that the characters are different and there a few events that are different. Alex, will have to find hi...more

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Mar 22, 2011 Nikolas Rex rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: did-not-finish

Good book, but lacking in some aspects

The Dead and The Gone was an interesting novel and a pretty good read but just had some things in it that didn’t quite click with me and as a result affected my reaction to the book. I had a lot of difficulty connecting the main character, his family, and his situation just because of all the catholic references; Not being catholic myself it was hard following the constant catholic references like Convent, Mass, Arch-Bishop I kept getting lost. Also the cata...more

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Dec 21, 2008 Karin rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: realistic, science-fiction, dystopian, young-adult-fiction, suspense-thriller, borrowed-from-the-library

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. After an asteroid crashes into the moon and knocks it closer to the Earth, Alex Morales and his sisters, Brianna and Julie, are left on their own when their parents don’t return. Alex has to take responsibility for himself and his sisters and keep what little is left of their family alive. Devout Catholics, the Morales siblings attend Catholic schools, which stay open for classes (and more importantly, lunches), and help keep the kids fed. They also stand in line every week for food. Alex’s frie...more After an asteroid crashes into the moon and knocks it closer to the Earth, Alex Morales and his sisters, Brianna and Julie, are left on their own when their parents don’t return. Alex has to take responsibility for himself and his sisters and keep what little is left of their family alive. Devout Catholics, the Morales siblings attend Catholic schools, which stay open for classes (and more importantly, lunches), and help keep the kids fed. They also stand in line every week for food. Alex’s friend, Kevin, who is fairly well-off, stands with them so they can get his food too (he doesn’t need it). Alex is able to send Brianna away to a convent for a few months – a working farm where she’ll receive three meals a day – but she returns with a bad case of asthma when volcanic ash begins to cloud the sky, and must stay inside and quiet in order not to upset it. Alex has to do a lot of distasteful things out of desperation, like ransack the corpses of the dead, and bargain for food with his found bounty. Alex calls in his last favor when he thinks they can’t survive any longer and obtains safe passage for himself and his sisters out of the city. Unfortunately, however, they aren’t able to leave due to quarantine. Alex comes down with the flu, and Bri and Julie have to nurse him back to health. Bri disappears just as Alex is recuperating, and Julie and Alex find her – dead in their building’s elevator – days later. The story ends on a hopeful note, however. Alex and Julie are to be taken on a bus to Georgia, where the church is sending its clergy for their safety.

Reading this on the heels of Life As We Knew It was more than a little depressing. While it was a whole different set of characters and a different look at how they survived the disaster, there’s only so much that can be different. The Morales kids were close to starvation (as was Miranda’s family), and they had to endure terrible cold, boredom (at least in Bri’s case), and other privations. It was probably worse for the Morales family because they’d lost more people who were close to them and they saw a lot more death (living in a large city). As I listened to this in my car it was late October, and I could feel the days getting shorter, and the nights getting colder, and I found it way too easy to believe that the seasonal changes could be due to some other crisis for which I was not adequately prepared. Theoretically, Susan Beth Pfeffer could keep working different angles of this crisis and keep finding new peoples’ lives (and woes) to portray. But I think I can only read so much before my anxiety causes me to seek out something more light-hearted.(less)

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Apr 19, 2013 Frank Wang rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Well, this is a great novel, the dead and the gone is definitely Susan Pfeffer’s best book. When I read this, it was for an assignment in our school. I would never, never -- read a book by myself, I think it is a waste of time, but this book changed it all.
I picked this book up because I was drawn by the cover; it gave me a “the end of the world” feeling. You may not understand right now, I’m going into design a bit. First off we have the gigantic moon on the top half of the cover that could be...more Well, this is a great novel, the dead and the gone is definitely Susan Pfeffer’s best book. When I read this, it was for an assignment in our school. I would never, never -- read a book by myself, I think it is a waste of time, but this book changed it all.
I picked this book up because I was drawn by the cover; it gave me a “the end of the world” feeling. You may not understand right now, I’m going into design a bit. First off we have the gigantic moon on the top half of the cover that could be an eye catcher for many people, the whole summary in now in the whole cover, an asteroid crashing into the moon, hitting it closer to Earth, then causing this whole butterfly effect. You know when you watch a werewolf movie, the moon is so big, and something bad is about to happen, well this is exactly like that, the dead feeling, the scary feeling. Last we have the raccoon city type of picture; the lighting in this case really made a big difference, the city picture itself would have made no sense, but the lighting made it seem like it is dead, which it is. Then we have the all familiar title of the book in the center, I just think this is a perfect cover page of a disastrous book.
Ok now going into the meat of the book, the overall of the book creates suspension, and a very horrifying yet emotional plot. From the beginning, the protagonist Alex Morales, woke up during mid night with his uncle Jimmy rushing into the house telling them to go grab food for no specific reason. Me and you at this point will be like “oh hell no, I’m going anywhere but back to wonderland.” But to my surprise Alex actually went with his uncle, and then realizing what had happened to the world he once knew. They grabbed food which lasted for about 1 month, (I don’t even know how they could’ve carried into their house, and where the heck did they get their food free?) Alex then went to school, found it closed, can’t resist the temptation of looking for his parents he went to the Yankee stadium to look for them finding nothing. Like come on, who will go look for their parents? He didn’t even know whether his mother had made it to the hospital or not, and with his father in Puerto Rico how could he even leave his sisters alone? Especially in this kind of situation. I guess he figured out soon enough. Sending his sister Bri to convent, making decisions for them, but I guess those are “all for the best”. Going through conflicts of sickness, natural disasters such as volcanic eruptions, volcanic ash blocking the sun light, and entering a new ice age, he began to grow from a naive child to a more mature adult. Just before he is about to go to a safer place, his sister Bri died, leaving only him and Julie, his youngest sister to accompany themselves, but at last they escaped from NY.
I loved the way Susan wrote the book. The 3rd person omniscient diary format was the best choice she made in her life. It allowed us to understand the character’s feelings, thoughts, and the reason why they made the choices they made. It was personally really “unreal” to me, because the events that happened were much unexpected. It’s sort of like Hobbit, Gandalf asking the hobbit to go on a journey. With no warning the asteroid came, I think with our technology we can figure the damage that’s going to do. Last but not least, there’s always that one really “up in the cloud” person, in this case is the super duper religious Bri, she refuses to believe her parents are dead, when I read till that point I was like “what a waste! Just live on, and you will find them someday. Overall it is an amazing book, it is somehow religious biased; I would want to recommend you to read the previous the life as we knew it, as it can help you to understand the whole disaster in a girl’s perspective, which can be very different.
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Jan 05, 2013 Livi rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wie auch schon der erste Band, gehört dieses Buch für mich zu einen der must-reads! Die Charaktere sind so durchdacht und auch die Hauptperson Alex lässt den Leser nicht los. Man sieht in von so verschiedenen Seiten, dass ich anfangs dachte "Kleiner ehrgeiziger Streber" aber im Laufe des Buches spürt man wie stark er im Inneren ist und gewinnt ihn lieb.

Die Situation in NewYork wird so klar geschildert, dass ich fast dachte körperlich anwesend zu sein. Ich kann nur schreiben was ich beim ersten B...more

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Dec 29, 2012 Ivy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: space, read-2012, young-adult

I feel these books really affected me. Maybe it's because it's cold and rainy in NorCal while its usually 72F and sunny but I felt like I was really experiencing this story. I lived in Manhattan in 91st and Broadway and this story is based 4 blocks from there. As the successor of "Life as we knew it" we see the story of a 17-year-old puertorrican guy who becomes the caretaker of his two sisters when their parents disappear after the sequence of disasters that happen when the Moon got knocked ove...more

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Nov 04, 2012 Rae rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was definitely a little skeptical about this book at the start - how could the author cover the same event without revisiting the same struggles we saw in the previous book? Would she be able to write from the perspective of a Latino boy convincingly? Would the page turning goodness of the first book carry over?

Fortunately, the answer is, for the most part, yes. I loved seeing what the disaster looked like in a big city. I thought the perspective on religion in the first book might turn off de...more

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Nov 04, 2012 Sinn rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

After reading this book, I have one question: what happened? When I finished reading Life as We Knew It, I was desperate to read the next books in the series. Once I started this book, I constantly found myself wondering what happened.

The Dead & the Gone follows Alex and his two sisters fighting for survival in New York City following the asteroid knocking the moon out of it's orbit. Like Miranda in the previous book, the Alex and his sisters struggle with food shortages, no electricity, no...more After reading this book, I have one question: what happened? When I finished reading Life as We Knew It, I was desperate to read the next books in the series. Once I started this book, I constantly found myself wondering what happened.

The Dead & the Gone follows Alex and his two sisters fighting for survival in New York City following the asteroid knocking the moon out of it's orbit. Like Miranda in the previous book, the Alex and his sisters struggle with food shortages, no electricity, no communication, and just about everything that goes along with an apocalypse. However, unlike Miranda, Alex and his sisters are alone; they must rely on each other for survival. Throughout the book, Alex is trying to find ways to provide for his sisters and find an escape from the city.

Unlike the first book, this one is not written in journal entries. Further, it is not told from Alex's POV. The author takes a third person limited perspective. The story follows Alex, his thoughts, concerns, and motivations. To me, the impact of the first book was primarily due to POV. I couldn't figure out why Pfeffer decided to take such a huge step back from the main character. In addition, the first book did a good job giving the supporting characters some depth. This book really lacked in that regard. At some level, Alex was fairly one dimensional. His sisters were stock characters, the priests were too stereotypical, and so on. To me, the only character that stood out was Kevin.

From the start, this book was rather stilted. The conversation was too forced, canned, and scripted. Really, if I am too be honest, the whole story was too formulaic. There was nothing that surprised me, I never felt impacted by the events in the book, and didn't feel anything for the characters. Honestly, I could have cared less whether they lived or died.

The ending was extremely anti-climatic. I found myself flipping through the extra material in the book, because I was convinced I had missed something.

This book was extremely disappointing. Life as We Knew It was amazing, well thought out, and brilliant. With this book, I am not sure what happened. At some level, I wonder whether Pfeffer should have just started and finished the series with the first book. After finishing this book, I am very timid about picking up the third book . . . If you're looking for an awesome continuation of Life as We Knew It, be ready for disappointment. Unless the third one really makes up for this book, I would suggest not reading The Dead & the Gone. (less)

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Oct 30, 2012 Erica rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the 2nd book in a 3-book series about the apocalypse. I am so engrossed in this series, it's not even funny. It's hard to say that I love these books, because I hate everything about the story, yet it's still a great story. It's hard to love a book about death, struggle, hunger, betrayal, and unimaginable need, but yet I can't put the books down.

Two things about this book as opposed to the first book: It was not in journal format which is a major plus. The story could go into so many mor...more

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Oct 05, 2012 Ainsley rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A meteor strikes the moon causing the world to have odd weather patterns and almost no electricity. Alex Morales has to mature fast because he has to become a father figure for his 2 sisters, after his dad went to a funeral in Costa Rica and his mom went to work one day at the hospital, and they haven’t returned back home. Alex doesn't know when they will return, but is staying strong to support his family in any way that he can. Bri, Alex’s sister is sent away to a camp for girls were she works...more

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Aug 17, 2012 Kimmy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read Life As We Knew It, the previous book in this trilogy, back in March and I loved it. This is the second book in the series. Here is the summary from the Kobo store:

Susan Beth Pfeffer’s Life as We Knew It enthralled and devastated readers with its brutal but hopeful look at an apocalyptic event–an asteroid hitting the moon, setting off a tailspin of horrific climate changes. Now this harrowing companion novel examines the same events as they unfold in New York City, revealed through the ey...more I read Life As We Knew It, the previous book in this trilogy, back in March and I loved it. This is the second book in the series. Here is the summary from the Kobo store:

Susan Beth Pfeffer’s Life as We Knew It enthralled and devastated readers with its brutal but hopeful look at an apocalyptic event–an asteroid hitting the moon, setting off a tailspin of horrific climate changes. Now this harrowing companion novel examines the same events as they unfold in New York City, revealed through the eyes of seventeen-year-old Puerto Rican Alex Morales. When Alex’s parents disappear in the aftermath of tidal waves, he must care for his two younger sisters, even as Manhattan becomes a deadly wasteland, and food and aid dwindle.

This story takes place during the same timeline as Life As We Knew It, except it follows Alex Morales and his family in New York City, rather than Miranda and her family.

Alex is at work at the pizza parlour when the asteroid hits the moon, but doesn’t realize the full effects until later, when his mother fails to return home from her job at the hospital. His older brother, Carlos, is in the military but his fate is uncertain, as is that of Alex’s father, who was attending a relative’s funeral in Puerto Rico.

And so it’s up to Alex to look after his two younger sisters: Bri, who is devout and who firmly believes that their parents are still alive somewhere, trying to get home; and Julie, whose attitude and emotional behaviour drives Alex crazy. He tries to keep things normal at first, insisting that he and the girls continue to attend their Catholic schools, and he also tries to shelter them from the increasingly harsh truths. For example, he buses out to Yankee Stadium, where some of the recovered dead bodies are displayed for people to see if they can identify any of them. Alex goes to see if their mother is there, but doesn’t tell his sisters about it.

As in Life As We Knew It, the environmental effects of the asteroid are severe: flooding, volcanic ash blocking out the sun, and freezing temperatures during summer months. Things just keep getting worse: food becomes scarce and valuable, dead bodies pile up in the streets of the city, and disease begins to spread.

This is one those stories that I couldn’t even try to predict or anticipate what would happen next (except that I figured that whatever it was, it would probably be bad!). I was just along for the ride as Alex tried to keep his family together. I liked that I didn’t know what was going to happen, even though I’d read the first book in the series, and I think part of that is due to the change in setting. While the main event that is the catalyst for the story – the asteroid colliding with the moon – remains the same as in Life As We Knew It, changing the setting from a rural town to New York City significantly altered the events that our new protagonist faced. Although the environmental effects and dangers like food scarcity were the same in each story and setting, there were different challenges and means of survival faced by Miranda and Alex.

I also liked the change of characters. I can’t really think of any other series I’ve read where the sequel had completely different characters than the first book. In fact, both books could definitely stand alone, or could be read out of order (although I think you’d really be missing out if you didn’t read Life As We Knew It as well). It was the contrast, though, between Alex and the previous protagonist, Miranda, that kept things feeling fresh. For example, Alex and his sisters are quite devout, attending Catholic school and even making sure to trek to church for Mass as things get worse, and their struggles with their faith during a time of crisis plays a large part in the story. In contrast, I don’t recall that there was much mention of God or church or religion among Miranda’s family in the previous book. Also, Miranda and her brothers had their mother to look after them. Alex, at just 17, became responsible for the safety of his younger sisters.

Although Alex faced significant challenges, including the deaths of some of those close to him, I thought that the ideas of hope and faith were still quite present, especially in his sister, Bri. In a story where the entire planet and everyone living on it basically seem to be dying, it can be so easy to make everything bleak and depressing, but I appreciated that Akex and his sisters found things to keep them going. (From http://pingwings.ca)(less)

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