num_pages: 514
description: Special Topics in Calamity Physics is a darkly hilarious coming-of-age novel and a richly plotted suspense tale told through the distinctive voice of its heroine, Blue van Meer. After a childhood moving from one academic outpost to another with her father (a man prone to aphorisms and meteoric affairs), Blue is clever, deadpan, and possessed of a vast lexicon of literary, political, philosophical, and scientific knowledge—and is quite the cineaste to boot. In her final year of high school at the elite (and unusual) St. Gallway School in Stockton, North Carolina, Blue falls in with a charismatic group of friends and their captivating teacher, Hannah Schneider. But when the drowning of one of Hannah's friends and the shocking death of Hannah herself lead to a confluence of mysteries, Blue is left to make sense of it all with only her gimlet-eyed instincts and cultural references to guide—or misguide—her.
language: English
title: Special Topics in Calamity Physics
titlecomplete: Special Topics in Calamity Physics
characters: Smoke Wyannoch Harvey, Arnie Sanderson, Norvel Owen, Eugenia Sturds, Lonny Felix, Fayonette Harper, Roy Withers, Ms. Gershon, Andreo Verduga, Lee Sanjay Song, Jefferson Whitestone, Blue van Meer, Pa Havermeyer, Victor Moats, Ms. Simpson, Natasha Alicia Bridges van Meer, Wilson Gnut, Alfred Johnson, Howie Valerio, Violet May Martinez, Frank Fletcher
genres: Fiction, Coming Of Age, Mystery, Mystery Thriller, Young Adult, Literature, Adult, Novels, Contemporary, Literary Fiction
ratings_count: 46592
places: Stockton, North Carolina
awards: awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: John Sargent, Sr. First Novel Prize, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: The Center for Fiction, awardedAt: 1167638400000
name: PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel
publisher: Viking Australia