The lost cause

Doctorow (Red Team Blues, 2023) tackles the cascading climate disasters of a not-too-distant future, one in which the Green New Deal is well established and the dissatisfied MAGA old guard is making trouble for a new generation of climate refugees. Brooks Palazzo, about to graduate from high school in Burbank, catches one of his grandfather's friends smashing solar panels on the school roof, railing against the perceived injustices of the GND. Brooks and his grandfather never really got along, so when Gramps dies, it's not much of an emotional hit. Despite his granddad's MAGA buddies and their threats, Brooks doesn't want to keep the house. He just wants to help house the displaced people Burbank promised refuge to and ultimately gets pulled into the center of finding creative solutions to housing in the face of threats from armed militiamen and lawyered-up plutocrats. Like many of Doctorow's novels, this sometimes veers into political-explainer territory, but the coming-of-age story will appeal to younger readers, and the overarching theme of working on solutions instead of falling into the tempting traps of violent confrontation is certainly timely.

Doctorow (Red Team Blues) plausibly imagines a near future in which catastrophic climate change has made multiple coastal cities around the world uninhabitable. Though the passage of a Green New Deal in the U.S. has helped combat rising temperatures, it has also stoked political fury on the aging right. Brooks Palazzo became an orphan at nine years old after his environmentalist parents died while fighting wildfires and restoring habitats in Canada. He moved in with his grandfather Richard, an abusive, unrepentant MAGA supporter, in Burbank, Calif. Now 19 and about to finish high school, Brooks stumbles on an attempt to sabotage his school's solar panels--and recognizes the perpetrator as one of Richard's friends. Shortly after Brooks thwarts this terrorist, Richard dies and Brooks inherits his house. With newfound resources at his fingertips, he becomes an activist and unlikely hero as the impending arrival of a refugee caravan raises political tensions. Brooks's bravery and idealism are admirable and, though a romantic subplot feels like a distraction, Doctorow does a solid job of imagining how acting both locally and globally in the face of environmental catastrophe can make a difference. Fans of Kim Stanley Robinson's New York 2140 will want to check this out. (Nov.)

In the 2050s, the U.S. is both sinking and burning due to climate change. Successive liberal governments have done their best to create a better future for everyone, alternating with die-hard conservative administrations that do their damndest to reverse the tides. Brooks Palazzo, a young man trying to make his city a better and more inviting place, is caught in the crossfire between welcoming a caravan of internal refugees and his grandfather's friends in their faded red caps and their agitation to keep their city for people just like them. Brooks and his friends have youth, experience, and above all drive, but his granddad's buddies still have guns stashed in the basement and are itching to go out in a blaze of glory. As grim as the setting is, because the novel is told from the perspective of Brooks and his friends, it's surprisingly hopeful as it delivers a well-told story with plenty of dramatic tension that still manages to convey the message that dealing with entrenched politics is a marathon race, the surest way to lose is to stop running. VERDICT Doctorow (Red Team Blues) tells a thought-provoking story, with a message of hope in a near-future that looks increasingly bleak.--Marlene Harris