In six months, a comet will strike Earth, and the only way to survive is to step through a "vertex" to another planet populated by humans from the future: that is what the holograms that have suddenly popped up across the globe are saying. Alexandra was already struggling with an anxiety disorder and the stress of her upcoming senior year, but the news that the world may soon end puts all of these everyday matters on hold. As the clock ticks and the government tries to stop the comet, everyone has to choose whether to believe the holograms and venture into the unknown or to stay on Earth. Acevedo's sci-fi series opener gives a tense, gripping look at the early days of an apocalypse, the disintegration of society as the last moments draw nearer, and the bonds that grow stronger in the midst of a planetary crisis. A heart-pounding cliff-hanger ending will pull readers to the sequel.

A reissue of the 2016 novel published as Consider.Alexandra Lucas and her boyfriend, Dominick, are about to start their senior year of high school when 500 vertexes-each one a doorway-shaped "hole into the fabric of the universe"-appear across the world, accompanied by holographic messages communicating news of Earth's impending doom. The only escape is a one-way trip through the portals to a parallel future Earth. As people leave through the vertexes and the extinction event draws nearer, the world becomes increasingly unfamiliar. A lot has changed in the past several years, including expectations of mental health depictions in young adult literature; Alex's struggle with anxiety and reliance on Ativan, which she calls her "little white savior" while initially discounting therapy as an intervention, make for a trite after-school special–level treatment of a complex situation; a short stint of effective therapy does finally occur but is so limited in duration that it contributes to the oversimplification of the topic. Alex also has unresolved issues with her Gulf War veteran father (who possibly grapples with PTSD). The slow pace of the plot as it depicts a crumbling society, along with stilted writing and insubstantial secondary characterization, limits the appeal of such a small-scale, personal story. Characters are minimally described and largely racially ambiguous; Alex has golden skin and curly brown hair.A glossy repackaging of a jejune tale. (Science fiction. 13-16)