SALTCROP

Two sisters set sail in a world beset by rising oceans and blight.

Carmen and Skipper Shimizu’s older sister, Nora, has gone missing. Since she moved to the city, she kept in touch and visited occasionally, but now they can’t get ahold of her and someone from her lab has contacted them asking to dispose of her things. Skipper, who has never left their small hometown, decides to take a radical step: She will sail to the city and find Nora. Carmen invites herself along and the two begin a journey that will take them through a world wracked by flooding and pollinator collapse. As they travel, they will see the state of the Earth, in both decay and rebirth, and witness the highs and lows that humanity can reach. On their trail is a multinational corporation, with its hands in worldwide agriculture, in more ways than the sisters know. A quiet but riveting story about life on a changing planet, this novel offers a realistic picture of the future we may experience, while never straying from the characters’ inner journeys and love for sailing at the heart of the novel. Kitasei focuses on the relationships among the three sisters and the conflict inherent in being true to themselves, while also laying out a plot that moves steadily forward through explorations and traps and a good deal of conspiracy. As the sisters learn how science can remake or take apart the world, they also meet complicated individuals striving to do the right thing, even when they sometimes fail. Wonderfully constructed and told, the sisters’ world is one full of both darkness and hope, as humans continue to find their way in a crumbling, changed environment.

Luminous, credible, and engrossing from beginning to end.