Razor Girl
Marianne Mancusi
Shomi (Dorchester), Sep 2008, $6.99
ISBN: 0505527804

As a teen everyone thought scientist Ian Anderson was a lunatic because he believed the world was coming to an end. Obsessed he obtained an obsolete fallout shelter and filled it with food and water to last six years. Ian trained his fifteen year old daughter Molly to protect herself by teaching her martial arts.

When a pandemic flu begins rapid spreading, no one thought anything of it unless they caught it; that is until rumors spread that the hospitals are refusing patients. Molly and her friend Chris Griffin investigate only to affirm it much more than the rumor. They watch a zombie kill someone. Her dad performs some surgical enhancements on his daughter to keep her safe. Soon afterward, Molly and her mom enter the shelter.

Six years later, Molly exits the fallout shelter only to have her mom die. She heads to Disney World to meet her father, who had stayed outside to work on a more permanent haven. On her trek, she meets Chris who calls himself Chase now; he explains the Others, as he and his few allies, call the zombies, are intelligent precise militias. As they search for her dad, they also protect eight little kids from the deadly pack.

This exhilarating apocalyptic thriller effortlessly rotates back and forth between just prior to and six years after the pandemic disaster although some readers will find that story line approach somewhat off-putting especially when a sequence hooks the reader. Still Molly is a fabulous superheroine as all shehas to do is save the world. Young adult readers will enjoy her efforts and the support from her sidekick Chase (gender bending the natural order intended it to be).

Harriet Klausner