A Children's Bible by Lydia Millet is a shortish fiction novel about apocalyptic destruction through the eyes of children with reckless parents. Initially, the story revolves around the children distancing themselves from their careless parents which is eh - average in story progression and then the novel does a 180˚ turn when the storm hits turning into one of insanity worth your time.

It transitions from a novel surrounding teen rebellion into one of survival and what is unique about the storytelling, kind of like The Road by Cormac McCarthy is the writing style. A Children's Bible is more ambiguously written with little to no dialogue from the protagonist which I view as a unexplainable drive that propels the story forward. This is a story that will creep up on you and intertwines different ways of thinking and symbolism into a narrative worth reading.

The plot can be broken into two sections: before the storm and after. Before the storm is a symbol of everyday life and after is a symbol of post-storm life. Without delving into the story, the post-storm section makes the plot. It drives the storyline and will make you intrigued as a reader. Before the storm, average. After the storm? Bam. Worth your commitment.

What can be noted about the characters is that they are mature but because of how they are written, insight into who they are is limited. You may observe the characters require a bit more insight to help improve the complexity of the storyline or you may value the ambiguity of who they are. The only character you truly see is Jack, the narrator Evie's younger brother and holder of the children's Bible.

Based on how I value characters, I wish there was more details on who they were BUT I think the limited details helps propel the narrative this is a novel worthy of discussion including the characters and what each individual reader gleans from them.

The ending of A Children's Bible hits you with a sense of "more!" What more will happen in this new post-storm world? What more will these children do? More. More. More. The ending leaves questions and based on the intent of the story, is a good thing. An ending which you will think "more," when reading.

The novel started off boring. The separation of the children and parents was evident along with the fact these parents were so desperate to relieve their glory days, they practically ignored their children and because of that, these children were quite mature for their age. That's all I have to say about pre-storm; it was clearly written to show divide and turmoil within the familial structure.

I am okay with how boring I found pre-storm to be because it demonstrated the mundaneness of life to really help divide normalcy with the now-future dystopian created by the storm. The post-storm I enjoyed and when the children made it to Juicy's mansion, I valued how their time on the farm translated to them being able to be self-sufficient. I want to know more about this post-storm dystopian world that was now the new normal but the allusions to it I found suited the novel better as the whole novel itself was quite allusive.

This novel is one worth discussing and one I found intriguing.