BEST OF ALL WORLDS

The discovery that he’s been cut off from the world beneath an invisible, impenetrable dome leads a Canadian teen into daunting challenges.

When a planned weekend turns to years of isolation at their country cottage for white-presenting Xavier Oak, his dad, and his stepmom Nia, who’s Haitian Canadian, the family must shift its efforts from futile bids for escape to simple survival. Receiving miraculous help with the difficult birth of Xavier’s half brother seems to prove that they were abducted by aliens. Three years on, they suddenly acquire new neighbors: the Jacksons from Tennessee, who are implied white. Husband Riley is a full-bore conspiracy theorist, who rants about “reptilian bloodlines” and a covert plot that’s reminiscent of the great replacement theory. He’s hellbent on escaping, sure that the government is secretly behind their predicament. Xavier, now 16, is half convinced that Riley is right, though his own judgment may be impaired by the blinding tides of adolescent hormones that rise when he meets Riley’s dazzling teenage daughter, Mackenzie. Oppel eventually hints at the truth, but until then he leaves readers to sift the evidence through their own social and political convictions. The plot heats up when the mysterious overseers are revealed along with a terrifying secret, and cultural frictions mount between the two families. Although Riley’s portrayal feels somewhat lacking in nuance, the choice Xavier ultimately must make is understandably agonizing—and, in the end, justified.

An idyllic scenario that turns increasingly creepy in this slightly message-heavy story.