A world without summer A volcano erupts, a creature awakens, and the sun goes out

Day (The Mona Lisa Vanishes) and Imamura (Love in the Library) chronicle the story of Mount Tambora's 1815 volcanic eruption in this intense accounting. Across four parts, engaging, sardonic-feeling text ("The world has been scheduled to end many times, yet it somehow never does") traces the disaster's initial shockwave through the Indonesian islands and the global consequences of the eruption, which caused weather anomalies that contributed to disease, drought, famine, and civil unrest. Day additionally describes how various groups, such as English farmers and Napoleonic War soldiers, were impacted by the blast and how societal differences like religion factored into peoples' understanding of its effects. References to cultural historical markers--such as the 1818 publication of Frankenstein--demonstrate major scientific and political by-products of the traumatic events. Government document scans, newspaper excerpts, and more culminate in a multifaceted narrative that illustrates how natural disasters affect climate change, and challenges readers to consider, "How do you tell a story when the people in the story don't know what's happening?" Graceful b&w drawings add personality to at-times graphic depictions of catastrophe. Sources conclude. Ages 10--14. Author's agent: Brenda Bowen, Book Group. Illustrator's agent: Susan Penny, Bright Agency. (Sept.)

On April 10, 1815, on the small Indonesian island of Sumbawa, the volcano Tambora erupted with such explosive force that it changed Earth's climate and thus the course of human history. The island was devastated by lava, rock, and ash, but the event -- far more explosive than the eruptions of Vesuvius or Krakatoa -- was little more than a footnote in many newspapers on the other side of the globe. In fact, the ash from this eruption rose high into the stratosphere and wreaked havoc around the world: torrential rain leading to unprecedented flooding; rapid changes in temperature that either caused or resulted from mysterious sunspots; dramatically shortened growing seasons without enough sun and rain; famine, disease, and rebellion among the people; and, years later, a global cholera pandemic. Day (Sibert and Boston Globe-Horn Book Award winner for The Mona Lisa Vanishes, rev. 9/23) crafts a remarkable nonfiction narrative that jumps forward and backward through time and across the globe, pulling seemingly disparate threads together and frequently breaking the fourth wall to ask readers to consider historical methodology, storytelling tropes, literary themes, and lessons learned. The subplot about Mary Shelley and the birth of Frankenstein initially seems forced -- until it does not: Day reveals the book and its themes to be a product of this time, this "world without summer." Black-and-white illustrations by Imamura, ranging from lively vignettes to dramatic full-page images, are interspersed (some final art not seen). An extensive bibliography, thorough source notes, and an index are appended. Jonathan HuntNovember/December 2025 p.84 (c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

A dramatic examination of both the immediate and long-term effects of recorded history's deadliest, most titanic blast: the 1815 eruption of Indonesia's Mount Tambora. "The wordloud isn't loud enough. The wordhot isn't hot enough. The word-- / None of the words are enough." Award-winner Day offers readers a rousing recitation of the catastrophes resulting from this "unfathomable" natural disaster after the millions of tons of ash and sulfates belched out by the volcano created a worldwide "climate shock." The results included floods, fires, crop failures, violent storms, disease outbreaks, and upended seasons: "A Feedback Loop of Bad," as one chapter heading puts it. He also draws sweeping but plausible connections to less direct but no less consequential events, including Mary Shelley's contemporaneousFrankenstein--he sees the book's "transfixing weirdness" as "a story straight out of the madness that Tambora made"--and the beginnings of mass westward population movements in the U.S. and the development of modern meteorology. Day includes reflection questions for readers in several places and points to Tambora as a cautionary tale of what we will all face, climate-wise, if we don't heed the warning signs. We're inescapably part of our planet's story, and "we're not the main character." Short chapters, a breathless narrative style, and spacious typography contribute to this work's accessibility. Final art not seen. Urgent and terrifying. (bibliography, source notes, index)(Nonfiction. 10-14) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.