FUTURELAND

Black seventh grader Cameron J. Walker has never been to a normal school before—he’s been busy hovering above major world cities in Futureland.

It’s 2048, and the high-tech theme park is filled with his parents’ imaginative inventions, including lifelike androids, or revs. But the plan this school year is to float above Atlanta so Cameron can enroll at Eastside Middle School, spend time with his Grandma Ava, and make some human kid friends. Plans go awry as corporate espionage and shady housing practices intersect before Futureland’s Atlanta opening. The Atlanta Disuse and Redevelopment Corporation and its shady White CEO have been spying on them, hoping to sabotage the park and appropriate its technology in its continued efforts to exploit the city for profit. Their plan involves hacking into revs, undermining the park’s—and surrounding community’s—security and safety measures, as well as abducting children to elicit fear and acquiring the space for themselves. These events evoke the real-life child abductions of 1980s Atlanta and the displacement issues the city faces today. The book is not entirely successful in handling weighty subjects like missing Black children, gentrification, and racial inequities. Aspiring detective Cameron struggles with self-doubt, something that is relatable for readers but also compromises the momentum of such a high-stakes story. Nevertheless, with the help of friends (human and rev alike), Cam saves the day. Final art not seen.

An imaginative and ambitious not-so-distant future tale with a lot to say about the present.