Orphans of Canland

<p><strong>A complicated rich and challenging work . . . An impressive debut that goes beneath surface issues of climate-apocalypse fiction.</strong></p><p><strong><em>-Kirkus Reviews (starred review)</em></strong></p><p><br></p><p>It's 2088 and the dust has settled on America decades after an environmental collapse. The eco-totalitarian organization WORLD has reconfigured society with the intention of restoring nature. Twelve-year-old eternal optimist Tristan Weekes lives in what he believes must be paradise: Canland an agrarian California desert-greening project. However Tristan's life-defining medical condition analgesia prevents him from feeling physical pain leaving his brain's stress centers unresponsive to everything from ego-blows to heatwaves.</p><p><br></p><p>Well-intended curious and wielding a stunning vocabulary Tristan loves to listen to the subversive theories spouted by his older brother Dylan a drug-addicted satellite hacker. He also wants to prove his independence to his mother Helena a powerful population control-extremist. Meanwhile all around him the survivors of the environmental collapse are just working toward a better tomorrow. But when a slew of violent acts befalls Canland Tristan must confront certain truths about the community he loves-including his family's secrets his own involvement in the horrors enacted by WORLD and the debts that are owed to the orphans of Canland.</p><p><br></p><p>In this work of literary fiction set against the backdrop of a frighteningly plausible dystopia Daniel Vitale explores the fate of our planet the nature of family and the duty of science as <em>Orphans of Canland</em> asks: What does it mean to belong on Earth?</p>