America Pacifica is an island hundreds of miles off the coast of California — the only warm place left in a world in the grip of a new ice age. Darcy Pern is seventeen; her mother has gone missing, and the novel details her quest to find out the truth about her disappearance — a quest which soon becomes an investigation of the disturbing origins of America Pacifica itself, and its sinister and reclusive leader, a man known only as Tyson. America Pacifica invites comparison with the work of Margaret Atwood and China Mieville, but also with Cormac McCarthy's The Road, for its post-apocalyptic scenario and the touching relationship between Darcy and her mother, and the Stieg Larsson trilogy for its implacable central character who is determined to uncover the truth.