Written by Jayse Smith
After The Lights Go Out is a terrifying yet hope-filled story of disaster, deceit, love, sacrifice and survival. – Fleur Ferris
The thing that makes Wilkinson’s novel scarier is the fact that the events which occur throughout are all things that could happen. What begins innocently enough when a father drags children to the mining town of Jubilee, which is literally the middle of nowhere, this feeling of innocence dissolves quickly as this YA novel becomes what’s being described as this decades’ ‘Tomorrow When The War Began’.
After what Prue Palmer believes is an electromagnetic pulse, caused by a solar flare, it takes out the power in their town. Prue and her twin sisters Grace and Blythe fear the worst for their father as he was at the mine where most of the population of Jubilee work. The girls must make a choice: do they stick to the plan to head to The Paddock, the bunker their father prepared which is stocked with enough provisions to last the four of them years? Or do they go against all their father has drilled into them and band together with the people of the town and share their knowledge and skills, something their father would have hated and would have punished them for doing. The psychological hold he has over his daughters borders insanity, and each time Pru has to make a decision Ricks voice is in her head saying ‘Good Girl’ to the decision that he has slammed into her head.
Wilkinson is given the chance to explore what extremes people would go to in a post-apocalyptic situation, which leads to some absolute gems of wisdom and insight. In a world without the luxury of modern technology—no cars to deliver stock to stores, no way of contacting the outside world—how desperate will the people of Jubilee become? It’s also so great to see realistic and accurate representation of indigenous people and culture through the novel since it is set in a remote part of the Kimberly region. Wilkinson sought permission from and learned about the traditional land owners which makes the novel feel even more authentic.
This book also makes the reader actually question their morals, who lives and dies in this new society? These are just some of the things that we are made to think about.
When the supplies in Jubilee run out people begin to turn on each other, people begin to get desperate, and the sisters decide to keep their bunker a secret (good girl). But in a turn of events the towns people find out about The Paddock, will Prue’s family be shunned, or will the townspeople of Jubilee forgive the fact that they’ve been lied to all this time?
This book is unputdownable with a thrill a minute and filled with adventure, which makes it totally worth how ever much time that it will take to read it. The twists and turns throughout you’ll never see coming and the characters are so well-developed, you’ll fall in love with them. Lili Wilkinson is on to a winner here, well researched, and perfectly executed!
All The Lights Go Out is now available on Book Depository, and at other good book retailers.
Have you read All The Lights Go Out? Or will you be checking it out? Tell us in the comments below!
Synopsis | Goodreads
What happens when the lights go off after what might truly be an end-of-the-world event? How do you stay alive? Who do you trust? How much do you have to sacrifice?
‘After the Lights Go Out is a terrifying yet hope-filled story of disaster, deceit, love, sacrifice and survival.’ – Fleur Ferris
Seventeen-year-old Pru Palmer lives with her twin sisters, Grace and Blythe, and their father, Rick, on the outskirts of an isolated mining community. The Palmers are doomsday preppers. They have a bunker filled with non-perishable food and a year’s worth of water. Each of the girls has a ‘bug out bag’, packed with water purification tablets, protein bars, paracord bracelets and epipens for Pru’s anaphylaxis.
One day while Rick is at the mine, the power goes out. At the Palmers’ house, and in the town. No one knows why. All communication is cut. It doesn’t take long for everything to unravel. In town, supplies run out and people get desperate. The sisters decide to keep their bunker a secret. The world is different; the rules are different. Survival is everything, and family comes first.
One Comment