无人幸免 (2017)

American War is the first novel by the Egyptian-Canadian journalist Omar El Akkad. It is set in the United States in the near future, ravaged by climate change and disease, in which the Second Civil War has broken out over the use of fossil fuels.

The plot is told by using historiographic metafiction by the future historian Benjamin Chestnut about his aunt, Sarat Chestnut, a climate refugee who is pushed out of Louisiana by the war. The narrative chapters are interspersed with fictional primary documents collected by the narrator.

The novel was generally well received and was nominated for several "first book" awards.

Plot

In 2074, after the passage of the Sustainable Future Act, a bill in the United States that banned the use of fossil fuels anywhere in the country and was the catalyst for the assassination of the President of the United States in December 2073 in Jackson, Mississippi by a secessionist suicide bomber, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and Texas secede from the Union, starting the Second American Civil War. South Carolina is quickly incapacitated by a virus released by the U.S. government known as "The Slow", a biological weapon that makes its inhabitants lethargic. Texas is invaded and occupied by Mexico, and the remaining bloc, known as the "Free Southern States" (Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia, or "The Mag"), continues to fight. The novel is told from the point of view of Sarat (Sara T. Chestnut) and her nephew, Benjamin.

Sarat is six years old when the war breaks out. She lives with her family on the coast ravaged by climate change in Louisiana. Her family consists of her parents, Benjamin and Martina; her older brother, Simon; and her fraternal twin sister, Dana Chestnut. After Sarat's father is killed during a terrorist suicide bombing in Baton Rouge in 2075, Sarat and her family relocate to a refugee camp called "Camp Patience", on the Mississippi–Tennessee border.

Sarat and her family spend the next six years living a squalid existence at Camp Patience. In 2081, when Sarat is 12 years old, she befriends the charismatic Albert Gaines, a recruiter for the Southern rebels. Gaines introduces her to Joe, an agent of the Bouazizi Empire, an emerging union of North African and Middle Eastern states based in Cairo, who helps deliver aid to the Free Southern States to keep the United States weak and divided. Later, a federal militia unit attacks Camp Patience and massacres many of the refugees, killing Sarat's mother and wounding her brother.

Following the Camp Patience massacre, Sarat and her siblings are resettled by the Free Southern government in Lincolnton, Georgia, on the border with South Carolina. The two sisters are joined by Simon, who is suffering from a bullet wound to the brain. Five years later, in 2086, the Chestnut siblings settle in to their new lives. While Sarat has become a member of Gaines' rebel group, the broken Simon is tended by a Bangladeshi American woman, named Karina. As time passes, Simon and Karina develop romantic feelings for each other.

During a guerrilla operation near a U.S. base along the Georgia-Tennessee border, Sarat assassinates General Joseph Weiland, a prominent U.S. commander. While Sarat is hailed as a hero by the Free Southern States, Weiland's assassination only hardens the U.S. government's resolve to end the Southern rebellion and leads to a crackdown against the Southern guerrillas. Sarat eventually grows disillusioned with the corrupt and self-serving Southern leadership. Later, Dana is killed when a rogue drone bombs a bus in which she is traveling.

Sarat is later captured by U.S. forces and imprisoned at the Sugarloaf Detention Facility, in the Florida Sea. Sarat later learns her mentor Gaines betrayed her to the U.S. For the next seven years, Sarat is repeatedly tortured, including being subjected to waterboarding. To end the torment, Sarat confesses to numerous exaggerated charges. Sarat is later released after the U.S. government deems Gaines to be an unreliable source.

Years later, Simon has married Karina, and they have a son, Benjamin. In 2095, the 6-year-old Benjamin meets his aunt, Sarat, who settles down on Benjamin's homestead. Sarat is later visited by one of her former rebel comrades, who informs her that his group has captured Bud Baker, one of her former Sugarloaf captors who tortured her. Sarat kills Bud but decides to spare his family after she discovers that his two teenage sons are twins.

Back at Simon's household, tensions between Sarat and Karina rise after Benjamin sustains a broken arm, and Sarat binds it with a crude splint. Benjamin is intrigued by Sarat and realizes that his aunt is still haunted by the attack at Camp Patience, her time as an insurgent, and her torture at Sugarloaf. As his arm recovers, Benjamin becomes friendly with his aunt.

Sarat is later visited by Joe, the Bouazizi agent, who recruits her into carrying a deadly virus during the Reunification Ceremony in the U.S. capital of Columbus, Ohio. Joe reveals that his real name is Yousef Bin Rashid, and the Bouazizi Empire wants to prevent the re-emergence of the U.S. as a superpower leaving the Bouazizi Empire and the People's Republic of China as the preeminent global powers. Seeking revenge against the U.S. government, Sarat accepts the offer and convinces her former rebel comrades to secure her passage to the Reunification Ceremony. Before leaving, Sarat visits the crippled Gaines at his cabin but leaves without killing him. She also arranges for her associates to smuggle her nephew Benjamin to safety in New Anchorage, Alaska. Later, Sarat infiltrates the Reunification Ceremony. While entering, she briefly encounters one of Baker's teenage sons whom she had spared; he now works as a guard there. He allows her in upon recognizing her without requesting any proper ID. The resulting "Reunification Plague" kills 110 million people and devastates the country, which is already war-torn.