It’s release day for The Consequences!
Tagline: She lost her family. Can she save her community, or will she lose her life trying?
Olivia survived the illness that killed her family, and now all she wants to do is escape her grief. She is hell-bent on getting to her horse, then maybe she will be okay. But what was once a fifteen-minute drive to the stable, is now an arduous seven-mile bike ride through a post-apocalyptic landscape.
When she arrives at the stable, her horse has died, and the stable owner desperately needs hay to save his other horses. With Brian the Dorkmeister in tow, she sets out to find the hay man, but when she does, he begs Olivia to journey on into the mountains for the medicine he desperately needs to save his youngest child from the illness.
As Olivia travels the destroyed landscape of washed-out roads and fallen timber, with no phone service, and no electricity, and an oncoming storm, her own illness recurs. How can she help anyone, and who can she trust in this crazy, broken world—the boy she pushes away or her unpredictable ex who once cared for her?
On this trail of survival, Olivia learns that she must first trust herself then maybe she can save the people she loves.
Avis Adams loves the Pacific Northwest and live near Forest Park in Portland, Oregon. She has two YA novels, The Incident and The Disappearing Names and one romance novella, The Christmas Wish Knotts, released from TWRP. She has a new YA novel, The Consequences, a sequel to The Incident. Her first love is poetry, and Quilcene, a chapbook, was published by Finishing Line Press. She belongs to the Baker Street Writers Group, and the Flamingo’s Reborn Writers and is an active member of the Willamette Writers. She volunteers at the WW office hours for critiques and brown bag lunches. She has taught English for three decades, most of them at Green River College, and she enjoys presenting sessions on writing craft at local conferences and writer meetings. In her spare time, she hikes, spends time with family (read granddaughter!), kayaks, cross-country skis, reads, and take long walks in Forest Park. But mostly, she loves to write.
I’ve never posted a blog about myself, so here goes! This is release day for The Consequences, book two in a trilogy on climate change, and I’m so excited!
The Consequences follows two teens, Olivia and Brian, as they journey into the mountains to save their friends and family from a deadly illness that is devastating their community.
I’m not going to do an interview with myself, but I will say that I love to write, and seeing my books in print is a lifelong dream! Thank you for reading and for all your support!
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Excerpt:
Brian shuffled his feet.
I sighed. Why did he have to care about me? I couldn’t afford to care about him or anyone, not after all the death, not after—
Perry Brewster. My chest constricted. The best-looking guy in the senior class, and he’d chosen me. Mom was furious and Grandpa didn’t approve, but Perry was a force I didn’t even try to resist.
The last thing I needed right now was another boyfriend. My breath caught in my throat. I was still raw after Perry. I lifted my bike and pushed it around a fallen tree. Why had Perry changed after his mom passed? Grandpa Billy and I had sat two rows behind him at her funeral. It was the last time he spoke to me, but I could tell something was wrong, I waited for him to get over his grief and come back to me, but I was hit by my own grief storm and quit caring.
I walked around in a fever, alone in our big house. Grief canceled Perry’s rejection. Then Dr. Johnson diagnosed, “Novel Hepatitis A Virus,” and I collapsed.
Novel HAV. What was “novel” about a disease? Emma said “novel” meant we had no immunity. All I knew was I had zero immunity to grief, and Shadow was all that kept me going.
I might shatter into a million tiny pieces if she was gone too.
“I need to get to the barn.” I glared at Brian. “She’ll fight to live if I’m there.” I lifted my bike from the ground and mounted, then stood on my pedals pressing with all my weight.
The crow glided between the trees left standing, and a tremor ran through me I pedaled harder past trees laying on the ground in a tangle and stacks of cord wood by Dad’s road clearing crew. Why didn’t they come back? Because of them, I had to pull my bike over all these logs.
“Hold up.” Brian pulled his bike in front of me.
“Now what?” I scowled at him.
“I just need to rest a minute.” He pulled out a water bottle and took a swig.
He meant he needed me to rest, but Dr. Johnson said to do what I was able to do, even if I was exhausted. My own doctor would know better than some dork on a bike.
“Fine.” I swung my pack from my shoulder. Two could play at this game. I reached into my pack for my water bottle. My fingers brushed a book cover, my journal. Dr. Johnson said writing might be cathartic and help me with my “grief.” Perry had surprised me with it on my birthday last April. I ran my hand over the cover. That had been a year ago.
I pulled out my water and took a deep swig. The Cascade foothills rolled from dark to lighter blue as they rose higher into the mountains, and I drank in the sweet mountain air. Brian kept his distance when we rode past the Forest Ranger Station. Maybe he was smarter than I gave him credit for?
I slowed down by the sign I’d taken for granted until now.
Mt. Rainier National Park
Mother Nature’s Playground
Our playground. I glanced behind me. Brian was staring at the abandoned station. Dad had kept this place running, but the windows remained dark since his—
I pressed on. Shadow had to be alive.
The cloud cover grew thicker, and the temperature dropped, but sweat trickled down my back all the same. I wiped my nose on the back of my sleeve. My ribs ached on my upper right side. Mrs. Z said grief had lowered my immune system. I was so sick of her harping on about the seven stages of grief.
I was stuck on 4. Depression, Reflection, Loneliness. Ugh. It was like that e.e. cummings poem, “Loneliness.” It seemed more like an anagram, a word game, than a poem. Mr. Woods loved that poem. I sighed. Sometimes memories of life before El Primo helped, but not now.
Avis M. Adams 
I love it!!!! Can’t wait to get mine.
Melanie
Sent from my iPhone
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congratulations! This book is fantastic. I loved it.
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