The Displacements by Bruce Holsinger

Sunday, Feb. 19, 2023--San Antonio

The Displacements by Bruce Holsinger is set in the near future.  It both references recent world disasters (hurricanes, tornadoes, wild fires, floods) that are a part of man-made climate change and presupposes the looming consequences for the world as disasters increase in strength and consequences.  The story is about a hurricane that is so large and so strong that it is beyond the scope of the present rating system for hurricanes-- causing scientists to have to expand the system to have a higher rating.  Not only is it the biggest and strongest hurricane ever, but it is on a path to create the greatest possible damage--a direct hit on Miami and then again, after regaining strength crossing the Gulf of Mexico, on Galveston and Houston.  The result is cities that are almost totally destroyed.  Miami beach becomes an archipeligo.  Downtown Miami and its near suburbs are near totally destroyed by the combination of winds and flooding--skyscrapers turned into twisted metal frames, homes and buildings torn to pieces and floated away, etc.  Although not described as thoroughly, the damage in Texas is almost as bad.  But the story is mainly set in Oklahoma where FEMA has set up a huge tent city, one of a dozen or so sites for "internally displaced citizens" (not refugees, because they are U.S. residents).  The book traces the story of various characters who end up at the Oklahoma camp--the disaster relief specialist who is in charge of setting up the tent city; one family from Miami that, although wealthy and prosperous before the storm, ends up destitute and taken by bus to there; an insurance salesman from Houston who also has a sideline job of being in charge of an illegal drug distribution ring and comes to the camp as a volunteer to assist those who are displaced while escaping the damage in Houston and stealing the latest shipment of drugs sent to him from the kingpins in Kansas City (a million doses peel-of films to be dissolved under the tongue) which allows him to continue his sideline job at the camp; and various other minor characters.  The story seems both realistic and plausible given the direction the world seems to be moving.  It's exciting and scary to read.  Yet another larger-than-normal natural disaster occurs toward the end of the book to reinforce that what had happened so far was not a fluke, but a sign of other, worse things to come.  Yet the main characters continue to strive to leave the shelters and create new lives for themselves in new locations in the meantime.  I gave the book 4 stars out of 5.