Peaceful Journey Essay, Research Paper

After the Bomb – Book Summary

After the Bomb written by Gloria Miklowitz is a thrilling

novel that takes place before, during, and after a bomb which

supposedly was sent from Russia by accident. L.A. and surrounding

cities are all altered by the disastrous happening. Philip Singer a

teenager is in a position as leader of the family. His brother Matt is

awfully sick, possibly from radiation, his father was away at work

during the blast and for all Philip knows he might be dead, and his

mother was desperately injured and needs immediate attention.

Hospitals are flooded with injured and dying people and the government

doesn’t send help for a few days. The badly injured don’t even get the

chance to be helped because the hospitals have to send the ones that

are likely going to live to hospitals that specialize in burns. His

mother is so badly burned that the hospitals put her on the bottom of

the list to be flown to burn centers. By the end of the novel Philip

has taken charge, snuck his mom ahead to be flown to a burn center,

and in a sense saved his town from thirst. He truly survived the

terror, shock, and danger of the bomb.

The novel goes through a couple of settings such as, Philip’s

struggle to keep his family alive, and the conflict between the nature

of a nuclear bomb against the Los Angeles area. When the bomb hits he

is playing around in a playroom shelter with his brother and his

girlfriend. They go out to find out what had happened and found

burning houses, their house only left with one wall, rubble on the

ground, debris all over the place, and people running frantically for

shelter. Philip’s brother became sick after finding his mother and

bringing her back down to the shelter, and found that his mother had

been burnt severely and needed immediate medical attention. Philip

struggles to keep his brother from getting even more sick than he was

and to bring his mother to a hospital. Philip’s family weren’t the

only people affected by the bomb. the entire surrounding area of Los

Angeles was pounded by a devastating bomb. Churches, Hospitals, and

streets were flooded with sick, dying, and even dead people.

Hospitals that were built to only withstand 200 people now have

thousands, and hospitals lack food, doctors, and water. Philip’s

struggle for survival, and the devastating blow against L.A. was only

the beginning of the disastrous bomb.

The setting is practically the whole plot of the novel showing

Philip’s struggle to get his mother to a burn center that could save

her life, bring his family to safety, and to save his town from

thirst. When Philip arrives at the hospital with his mom the

government and hospital had already started flying patients to burn

centers, but his mom was too sick and burnt so the hospital didn’t

care for her. She was placed on the bottom of list to be flown away.

Philip secretly switches the tag on her mom with one that says and

earlier number so that she would be flown out more promptly. He does

so and she is flown out early and he most probably saved her life by

doing so. Another example was when the bomb had just struck and

Philip’s family was in the shelter which wasn’t very safe and stable.

He went up to the surface to check out his neighbor’s house which was

miraculously intact. Philip found the owner and his wife in good shape

and arranged to bring his family over to the neighbor’s cool basement

for safety and refuge. A third example was when the hospital in his

town was almost pout of water and Philip was asked by a nurse

to find a worker that works with the town’ s plumbing at his house and

manage to get water to the hospital. He did so and after a while

drained water from a resident’s pool and had it flown down to the

hospital. These are some examples of how the setting functions in the

novel.

After the Bomb is an exciting and stimulating novel which shows

the leadership of a teenager over his family. The novel displays

a realistic happening that can happen any second and describes it

intricately. It’s an electrifying, terrifying, and exhilarating rush

and is an outstanding novel. Survival was only the beginning…