Life As We Knew It
Final Project By Abbie Griffin
Life As We Knew It By Susan Pfeffer
Plot Summary
The moon is hit by an asteroid. No big deal, right? Wrong. When this asteroid hits, it knocks the moon closer to the Earth, causing tide changes, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, tornadoes, snowstorms, thunderstorms, and climate changes. Naturally, this causes some problems. Oil rigs are knocked over by waves which causes oil spills, which causes gas shortages. Ash from volcanoes clouds up the sky and makes growing food and flowers, etc. difficult. Miranda, a teenage girl, and her family must survive through this disaster. Miranda keeps a diary throughout her survival, showing her story and survival techniques.
Main Characters
Miranda
Miranda is the main character and the book is written as her diary. She is 16 at the start of the book, and is 17 when the book ends. She starts off worrying about normal things that teenagers worry about, but later has the worry about feeding herself.
Jonny
Jonny is Miranda's younger brother. He is 13 at the start of the book, but later turns 14. He loves baseball and at first, worries more about MLB teams than his family. He must mature quickly to survive. Because he is the youngest, and the strongest, he is fed the most so that if the rest of the family doesn't survive, then he can.
Matt
Matt is Miranda's older brother who is a college student. Miranda looks up to Matt and always has. He spends most of his time after the disaster chopping wood so the family can stay warm in the winter.
Mom
Miranda's mom keeps the family alive throughout the story. She eats the least so her children can eat more. She makes many decisions to aid their survival. Sometimes she is sometimes seen as strict but is doing it all to keep them all alive.
Dan
Dan was Miranda's boyfriend. They spent a lot of time together in the summer swimming at Miller's Pond. Dan asked Miranda to prom if it happens, but he left to go to California to find his sister. Miranda never saw him again.
Sammi
Sammi used to be one of Miranda's best friends. But when Becky, a friend of theirs dies before the book begins, it causes change and separation. Sammi begins to date many different guys and eventually leaves town with a 40-year-old man named George. They went to the south to try to have a better chance of survival.
Peter
Peter is a doctor who is kind-of Miranda's mom's boyfriend. They never dated, but they definitely would have! He elps out the family and always tells them new ways people are dying, giving them a heads up. He usually gives gifts when he visits, too. He helped out mom when she hurt her ankle, but unfortunately died from the flu.
Megan
Megan was one of Miranda, Sammi, and Becky's friends. After Becky died, Megan changed, just like Sammi. Only Megan became extremely religious. She prayed all the time and read the bible a lot. She hung out more with her church friends than Megan or Sammi. They all stopped sitting together at lung after a while because Megan and Sammi would just fight. She started to stop eating and eventually starved to death.
Lisa
Lisa is Miranda's stepmom. The book starts out with Lisa asking Miranda to be her baby's godmother. Miranda gets constantly annoyed with her but can't stay annoyed because Lisa always does something nice. She leaves with Miranda's father and it is never revealed what happened to them. All they know is that Lisa and Dad were stuck at Kansas' border. They were headed for Colorado. Miranda never knew whether or not the baby was born, but to comfort herself, she pretended that she had had a girl named Rachel.
"We may not have a future, but you can't deny we have a past."
Survival
To survive, many measures were taken by Miranda and her family, such as;
- " Crazy Shopping Day"- Miranda, Jonny, and their mom buy a bunch of food and supplies so they'll have enough to survive.
- Rationing food- They all rationed their food so they can eat more longer.
- Chopping wood- Matt, and sometimes Jonny, would chop wood everyday until it got too cold so they could be warm in the winter.
- Practiced Skiing- Miranda, Matt, and Jonny practiced skiing everyday so if they had to leave to go somewhere while there was snow, they could get there quickly and efficiently.
Events
Moon Collision
Everyone was hyped up about an asteroid hitting the moon. But, once it happened, it turned into sheer terror. The moon was much closer, and Miranda and others could see the details in the moon. There were tsunamis and earthquakes all over the world, and every burst into panic. The family went inside to check the news, but everyone was just as clueless as them. Little did the world know what was ahead of them.
Chocolate Chip Incident
One day, Miranda decided to check the pantry to see how much food there was left. She saw a bag of chocolate chips, which she had thrown into the cart on Crazy Shopping Day. She began to eat them, since her mom was asleep and wouldn't find out. Well, her mom finds her eating the chocolate chips and they start arguing. Miranda is talking with her hands, and spills chocolate chips all over the floor. Her mom makes her eat every single one on the floor and in the bag before she tells Miranda that she was saving those chocolate chips for Matt's birthday.
Town Hall
Miranda hopelessly walked to the post office one day to see if her father had written her family. Unfortunately, she didn't find any letters. What she did find though, was a bright yellow flyer that said; "Town Hall Open Fridays, 2-4". She decided to walk there and see if it was open. Luckily, she found that she could receive food weekly from town hall. So, she then goes home with four bags of food, which is one for each week. Town hall officials come back a day or two later with twelve bags, and this is about where the book ends.
Themes
- Be thankful for what you have- Often times in the story, Miranda realizes how she took so many things for granted, and this really changes her. She is thankful for getting a A on a test at the beginning of the book, and towards the end, is thankful for food, which she'd normally take for granted.
- Survival- This may not really sound like a theme, but everything that they do in this book is for the sake of survival. They want to do whatever it takes to live until life is as close to normal as it can get.
Setting
This book takes place in a small town is Pennsylvania. There is never a specific town named. They all live in a house near the woods, which is lucky for them because there house has a wood stove. This is why Matt chopped wood for months.