Stephen is a scavenger.  He travels around a post-biological-attack America with his father, looking for usable items and avoiding threats.  One day he finds himself in need of help and a group of strangers come to his rescue.  They have built a microcosm of civilized society in what used to be a gated neighborhood.  Dystopian and post-apocalyptic settings are all the rage in teen literature today.  In a field overflowing with books of this type, this is one of the good ones.  In a blurb on the jacket, Suzanne Collins (author of The Hunger Games) describes this novel as “taut,” and she has found just the right word to describe it.  The first chapter opens with Stephen and his father burying Stephen’s grandfather and they are immediately thrust into a dangerous situation.  Eventually Stephen is forced to make important decisions without the help or advice of his father.  As he struggles to decide what the “right” thing to do is in a world where every choice is life-or-death, the reader witnesses a true coming of age.  This is a novel which will catch teen’s attention at the very beginning, make them think, and keep them reading through to the end.