Defiant

This is a remarkable, breakneck debut YA novel set on the high seas. It begins with a day like any other day. Well, the weather is a bit strange but otherwise it's a totally normal day in San Francisco. A ragtag group of kids from the last-chance Greenly School are on a field trip aboard The Defiant - the ship of legendary explorer Sir Francisco de Ventana - when all of a sudden a pink flash lights up the sky and a huge wave unmoors the ship from the dock, with Archangel, Esme, Baron, Dwayne, Rose, and Carlos still aboard. Suddenly the kids find themselves sailing the open waters alone in a strange world they barely recognize. Now the kid-crew of The Defiant must navigate dangerous waters, learn to survive life at sea, and decode the instructions in Ventana's mysterious guidebook, The Codex Mare. While searching for safe harbour, the crew discover strange colonies of other kids on tiny, isolated islands. They also find themselves being tailed by an ominous, red-sailed ship. Through their adventures, the students face hardships and catastrophes that test their resolve and their bond, and threaten their very survival. A remarkable debut (and the first ever YA novel to be published by McSweeney's), "The Defiant" combines the global and moral explorations of "Gulliver's Travels" and the social dynamics of "Lord of the Flies" while creating a wholly original and exciting new world all its own.