Waving at the Moon — Maggi Andersen

In a post-apocalyptic world, Evie French has just turned seventeen. She and her cousin, Marcus Peters, sixteen, struggle to survive after being left alone in their parent's bed and breakfast hotel in outback Australia. An endless drought has killed Evie's father's avocado trees and all the surrounding habitation. Nothing grows in the fetid soil. Hope comes in the form of a nineteen year old boy, Joel Pitt. He arrives on his motorbike with his dog, Rasputin, bringing supplies. He climbs the tallest tree on the crest of the hill, and locates an area of green down along the coast, hundreds of miles away. The three pile onto the bike, with Marcus and Rasputin in the sidecar, and embark on a trip that will take them over mountainous terrain with a limited supply of food and water. What might they find if they reach the coast? Will other people have survived the devastation? And who bombed their country? No one seems to know.