Evie, the narrator of A Children’s Bible, her younger brother, Jack, and her parents have rented a large house for the summer on the east coast along with a number of other families. The parents spend their days drinking, using drugs and having sex, so their children look upon them with disdain and learn to spend their time without parental supervision. When a huge storm hits their vacation home as well as much of the eastern United States, the children run away to what they hope is safety.

A Children’s Bible is a small book with a big wallop. It is tense, exciting, frightening, timely, full of symbolism with lots of ideas to discuss. Evie is a great main character-complex, caring and wise beyond her years. This is the first book by Lydia Millet that I have read, but it certainly won’t be the last.