Climatic Crisis by C G Penne (Book Review)

Climatic Crisis by C G Penne

Synopsis from Publisher:

This is a modern-day tale of a family scattered over the globe who experience various different weather phenomena, spectacular, dangerous and awe inspiring. Some suffer heart rending injuries, others the devastating loss of loved ones. It is a fight for survival against all that Planet Earth can fling at them, enraged with the Human Race who have placed importance on economies and compilation of wealth rather than respecting the natural resources of their wonderful world. The seas are contaminated and marine life is dying. The temperature on land is so hot that fires are destroying large parts of the forests. It is a race against time and every second counts as governments around the world endeavour to set right the years of neglect and pollution. But will they be in time?

Note: The book does contain some description of domestic abuse and violence.

My Review:

Planet Earth is fed up with humankind! After decades, nay a century, of disregard and literally contempt for the way it has been treated, the planet decides to fight back. We can’t say the warnings weren’t there – climate change has grown worse by the year. Many of us Baby Boomers who were coming of age in the 1960s and 1970s tried to warn those in power – in many cases even our parents wouldn’t listen to us, branding us idealistic. But the indiscriminate dumping of trash, debris, plastic, chemicals, etc. into the environment has made the planet unlivable. Succeeding generations lived with abandon, totally disregarding the increasingly toxic living conditions. Although there were pockets of people with good intentions to clean up the planet – really, how much can you do with one Clean-The-Planet day each year? – things simply continued to worsen.

Climatic Crisis picks up the story on the day that Planet Earth decides to fight back. We follow Don and Linda who are the victims of a storm at sea that sinks their cruise ship. Then we move to their extended family: daughter Emma living in Cornwall with her children who become victims of a tsunami; Emma’s husband Patrick currently in New York who witnesses the attack of three tornadoes; other daughter Jen living in Australia where she and her children must survive the vicious wildfires in the Australian bush; not to mention the toxic orange waste that fills all the sources of water. Along with them there are several other characters who must survive other natural disasters. And just when we are led to believe that Planet Earth has wreaked her vengeance and is now content to see mankind making good on decades old promises to clean up the planet, the final devastating blow is dealt.

The story is ripped from the headlines that we all so blissfully choose to ignore, choosing instead to listen to the platitudes fed to us by politicians: ‘we’ll need to study it further’, ‘we’re leaving a smaller carbon footprint’, we project that in twenty years the climate will get better’, etc. Climatic Crisis is a book for NOW! It will keep you turning pages.

While I truly believe the story is a strong one, there are many factors that gave me pause. Most of them could have been fixed by a good editor and proofreader. Unfortunately, the errors were too great to ignore. For that reason I’ve deducted 1.0 stars from what should have been a 4 star rating.

Note:  I was gifted a copy of the book by the author.

Rating: 3 stars