16. After

After, by Francine Prose (2004)

Francine Prose wrote a book I liked a lot, called Blue Angel. It kind of fell apart at the end, but that didn't ruin the rest of it for me. She was a visiting writer on campus the first year I was here, but I somehow didn't get to her reading. I've always meant to read more by her, but hadn't until I saw this one at a discount book store in Seaside, OR, while I was on vacation. It surprised me that I hadn't heard Prose had written a book for young readers, and I was curious.

After takes place in a high school, just after a school shooting at a different high school not far away. The story follows the bizarre and frightening aftermath of the shooting, as the school installs a new administrator and enacts ever-tightening security and stricter rules. While pretty obviously an allusion to the erosion of civil liberties after 9/11, I think Prose manages this parallel gracefully. To a teen reader, I imagine it reads more subtly than it did to me. After really reminded me of early YA lit, like The Chocolate War and I am the Cheese, which I mean as a compliment. I'm again surprised I didn't hear about this one earlier--if it got attention, I completely missed it.