Chasing Helicity (Ginger Zee)

Chasing Helicity
The Chasing Helicity series, Book 1
Ginger Zee
Disney Hyperion
Fiction, MG Adventure
***+ (Okay/Good)

DESCRIPTION: Thirteen-year-old Helicity Dunlap has been drawn to weather her whole life, obsessing over clouds the way some people - like her father and her older brother Adam, who just landed a football scholarship - obsess over sports. To pursue a career in meteorology, though, she'll need better grades in math and science... and the day of the summer picnic, she just found the letter from her middle school advising against her taking advanced classes next year in both. She just wanted to clear her head with a ride on her horse Raven, up to the hills above their home - only to witness the storm that will destroy her small Michigan town, and her life.
In the aftermath of the tornado, Helicity loses her home (reduced to kindling by the winds), her horse (panicked and fled), and maybe even her family. Her brother Adam's in the hospital with a broken arm that may end his football career before it can even begin, and as invisible as Helicity felt before, that's nothing compared to the guilt she feels now: Adam was going to look for her when the storm warnings went out, but she'd drained her phone battery on storm pictures before she could text him that she was okay. But out of the wreckage comes an unexpected opportunity, when a meteorology professor from the local community college asks for any photos or videos of the storm - both of which she has in her cell phone. This might be the start of a wonderful new path for Helicity, one that will lead her to a life she could truly love - but, with her father angry at her and her family and town in turmoil, what will that opportunity cost her?

REVIEW: This is another case of opportunistic reading (or listening, rather) on the Libby app based on whatever happened to be available when I needed to reload options. Written by a chief meteorologist for a national news network, it shows a true love for the phenomena of weather and a respect for the unpredictable power of storms. Helicity's very name (meaning a helix-like spin, like that seen in storms) evokes the power of a gathering hurricane or tornado, a name bestowed in honor of a late physicist grandmother whom she never met, but among her family she feels as invisible as the wind, what with her brother's sports scholarship dominating the dinner table talk. After the storm, her father's one of the loudest voices shouting down the meteorologist seeking more information about the twister, whom many in the down see as a useless opportunist out to exploit the people's suffering for minimal (if any) tangible benefit; if the scientists were really so smart, why couldn't they do a better job predicting the monster that smashed their homes and wrecked their lives, and why do they only ever show up after the fact? But the moment Helicity sets eyes on the woman, she feels the spark of connection, like she's looking at her own future - or the future she hardly dared to let herself want. If she does want it, she's going to have to fight for it, something she's not used to doing. As Helicity delves deeper into the world of meteorology and storm chasing from the inside, she learns the true stakes and scope of what it means to study the weather and follow storms... and learns too how risky it is even for seasoned professionals. Even when she gets what she wants, she may not be ready for the real thing.
There's also a subplot about Adam, the brother whose injury causes her so much guilt and has potential to derail his life, but not in the way that she and her family initially feared... a subplot that's left entirely unresolved by the end, among a few other notes that felt a bit too up in the air. This sense of incompleteness is partially explained by this being the first book in a series, but even then, something about the book felt a bit unbalanced, leaving me just unsatisfied enough to shave a half-star off the rating. Other than that, though, it's a nicely gripping story of a girl discovering her passion and finding the courage to pursue it in the face of numerous setbacks, with characters who aren't usually quite as simple or flat as they might seem at first and conflicts that feel genuine, along with some solid science on weather phenomena that manages to inform without ever feeling like a lecture.

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