All Better Now

A deadly and unprecedented virus is spreading. But those who survive it experience long-term effects no one has ever seen before: utter contentment. Soon after infection, people find the stress, depression, greed, and other negative feelings that used to weigh them down are gone.

More and more people begin to revel in the mass unburdening. But not everyone. People in power—who depend on malcontents and prey on the insecure to sell their products, and convince others they need more, new, faster, better everything—know this new state of being is bad for business. Surely, without anger or jealousy as motivators, productivity will grind to a halt and the world will be thrown into chaos. Campaigns start up to convince people that being eternally happy is dangerous. The race to find a vaccine begins. Meanwhile, a growing movement of Recoverees plan ways to spread the virus as fast as they can, in the name of saving the world.

It’s nearly impossible to determine the truth when everyone with a platform is pushing their agenda. Three teens from very different backgrounds who’ve had their lives upended in very different ways find themselves at the center of a power play that could change humanity forever. 

In classic Shusterman style, All Better Now forces the reader to question everything and consider a world where altruism may upend society. The story focuses on three completely different characters—Rón, the son of one of the world’s wealthiest men; Mariel, a homeless teenager whose mother dies from the virus; and Morgan, an ambitious young woman who hungers for power and trusts no one. While the teens are interesting characters, they are neither relatable nor likable. However, each one showcases a different aspect of the virus, allowing readers to understand each person’s worldview.  

After Mariel’s mother dies, she purposely tries to infect herself but discovers that she is immune to the virus. At first, Mariel is disappointed that she will never experience the contentment of Recoverees, but she also acknowledges that Recoverees often make illogical decisions that lead to their demise. There is only one thing that Mariel knows for sure—everyone should have the choice when it comes to exposure to the virus.   

Unlike Mariel, Rón and Morgan do not believe people should have a choice. Morgan’s goal is to stop the virus from spreading, while Rón believes infecting others with the virus is his duty. Rón says, “It’s one we want to give to people we love, not because it makes us do it against our will, but because we choose to—because it generally makes our lives better.” On the other hand, Morgan believes anger, fear, and resentment are “the things that drove civilization. . . a world without ambition was not a world at all; it was a soulless still life hanging on a wall.” Throughout the story, the characters are confronted with difficult questions and the reader is forced to put themselves in each person’s shoes and decide what they would do in a similar situation. 

In classic Shusterman style, All Better Now forces readers to contemplate the idea of contentment and altruism. While on the surface, these are traits that everyone should be able to embrace, Shusterman shows how compassion and empathy can be taken too far. The exciting conclusion is ambiguous, leaving the reader to question the morality of the virus. Due to the complex plot, multiple points of view, and the complicated nature of the conflict, All Better Now is best suited for mature readers.  

Sexual Content  

• Morgan, a genius with few friends, simultaneously dates a brother and sister. When they find out, the relationships end. 
• After getting the virus, Dame Havilland and her butler move in together. After Dame Havilland makes a sexual innuendo, Morgan thinks, “Old-people sex should be outlawed. Or at least the discussing of it.” 
• In a medical lab, some of the animals are “masturbating.” 
• Rón meets a gay teenager who has a crush on him. Rón “leaned forward and kissed Elias. Elias all but went limp. Rón didn’t particularly like the kiss, nor did he particularly hate it. It was like a sip of water; just a thing with no flavor. But what Rón did like were the stars in Elias’s eyes. Then it was done.” Rón leaves and never sees Elias again. 
• The cops bust into Elias’s house, looking for Rón. The SWAT team tells everyone to get on their knees. Elias says, “Sorry if I’m a little giddy. But it’s my first time on my knees for a man in uniform.”  
• A vindictive woman who wants revenge tries to “have condoms and erotic magazines delivered to [a married couple] at every place they dined.” 

Violence  

• A chapter focuses on Yuri Antonov, who is in the Air Force. He and two other men are ordered to destroy a bridge. Instead of destroying the bridge, Yuri “skews his vector, clipping the wing tip of the jet to his left. . . [the other jet] begins a barrel roll to the ground. The pilot has no choice but to eject. . .” The other pilot tries to get away, but Yuri “slides in behind his wingman and fires his guns, shooting up the tail, and one engine—being careful not to hit the cockpit.” Both pilots parachuted to safety.  
• Dame Havilland wants to use Morgan’s mother as leverage. To get access to Morgan’s mother, Dame Havilland has to get past Griselda, the live-in nurse. “Griselda was grabbed from behind” and a man “held a handkerchief over her nose and mouth. . . everything began swimming like fishes, Griselda’s legs seemed to vanish.” Griselda is uninjured. 
• One of the human test subjects in a medical lab corners Morgan. The man “pressed her against the wall, brought up the shard of glass, and swiped it across her neck – tearing a gash in her hazmat suit.” He breathes into her suit, trying to infect her with the virus. 
• When a SWAT team forces their way into a house looking for Rón, Rón heard “a weapon discharged, and a spatula clattered to the ground.” Later, Rón discovers that “the Davenport city planner had been shot and killed.”   
• Rón accidentally sets a tourist destination gift shop on fire. The fire blocked some people’s path, including Mariel, a teenager Morgan has been looking for. A driver tries to help by jumping in the fire. “Morgan knelt down to the driver, who was covered in blistered, blackened, third-degree burns, but still clinging to life. . . And then he died. Just like that.”  
• One of the medical test subjects, a convict sentenced to life in prison, is given a vaccine. In her fever dreams, she sees “the faces of her victims staring in accusation. Her father looking the way he did when he beat her. . . She relives every hit she ever took, every bone she ever broke.”  
• When Recoverees attack Morgan’s medical lab, her coworker, Preston, takes a vial of the counter-virus. When he leaves the lab, the intruders try to stop him. Preston “charged, barreling toward them, and smashing the heavy flashlight as hard as he could on one of their heads. The intruder went down.” Preston runs and is “hit by a single bullet in the hip—and even though it didn’t penetrate, he couldn’t believe how much a rubber bullet hurt.” Preston escapes. 
• Mariel and Rón are in the medical research center when it explodes. “Mariel lay beneath the smoldering debris. She was broken. . . Grimacing, she sat up to find Rón wasn’t moving. A heavy piece of concrete had come down on his side, and another was on his leg.” They are both injured but survive. 
• To get her money back, Dame Havilland must kill Morgan. While Morgan is unconscious, someone puts an astronaut suit on her. Then, Dame Havilland pushes her off a boat into the Norwegian Sea. Morgan “disappeared, space suit and all, in a single splash, gone beneath the waves as if she had never been there at all.” Morgan walks to land. 
• After the medical research lab is destroyed, “They found evidence of a mass grave on the mountain. Test subjects.” 

Drugs and Alcohol  

• An old woman has a glass of “some sort of spirit.”  
• Morgan fires her chauffeur because “he smelled faintly of whiskey.” 
• Rón gives a woman “a robust Malbec.”  
• Rón goes to a concert where he can smell “beer and pot on people’s breath.” 
• After possibly being infected with the virus, one of the medical researchers uses cyanide to kill herself. 
• When Morgan’s staff finds a way to stop the virus, her coworker looks for champagne but can only find vodka. They don’t drink it. 
• While in the hospital, Rón is given “morphine or something along those lines” to help with the pain.  

Language  

• Profanity is used occasionally. Profanity includes ass, asshole, bloody, bitch, crap, damn, dickwad, fuck, goddamn, hell, holy crap, and shit. 
• Jesus, my God, and Mother of God are used as exclamations. 

Supernatural 

• None 

Spiritual Content  

• When Rón tried to commit suicide, “his father sat by his bedside the whole time he was in the hospital, praying over rosaries Rόn didn’t know he had, and then in Hebrew, which Rόn didn’t even know he knew. Old Testament God, New Testament God. Yahweh, Jesus, Allah, Vishnu—it didn’t matter as long as one of them answered.” 
• After Rón runs away, his father gets a clue to Rón’s whereabouts and he “wept, offering prayers of thanks in Spanish, in Hebrew, in Latin, in Arabic—to whatever version of God could hear him.” 
• A man “prays to a God he never actually believed in that this virus will pass him by.” 
• Rón infects a lady who sings in the church choir. He thinks, “Open mouths happily expelling air, trusting the good Lord to keep them safe. Or at least infect them with joy. But God needed a servant to do that.” 
• Morgan meets the wealthiest man in the world. She says, “It must be quite a thrill to create things on a whim. You must feel like a God in this Fortress of Solitude.” The man replies, “Nothing but smoke and mirrors. I don’t delude myself into thinking it’s anything more.” 
• Morgan and Rón stay the night at a random Recoveree’s house. A teenager shows Rón to his room and says, “My mom won’t let you share a bed if you’re not married. Just how she is.” The teenager says that his father’s death “drove her to Jesus.” The boy’s mom believes he’s going to hell because he’s gay. 
• While having dinner at the recoveree’s house, she says, “If the Word could become flesh—who’s to say that the Word couldn’t also become virus? . . . Maybe this is what Holy Communion has been pointing to all along; taking in Jesus—God becoming part of us.”  
• When Morgan’s medical facility is destroyed, Morgan flees and takes a commercial flight. She thinks she is safe because “whether or not she was worthy of life, no God, real or fictional, would kill all these people just to get at her.”