All Better Now by Neal Schusterman

All Better Now, a thought-provoking read for mature teens, grapples with the consequences of a different kind of pandemic.

All Better Now by Neal Shusterman. Simon & Shuster, 2025, 515 pages.

Reading Level: Teen, ages 12-15

Recommended for: ages 16-up

Another virus is sweeping across the globe, this one much more contagious and lethal than COVID. Masks, social distancing, and hazmat suits have reappeared with a vengeance, because roughly one in 25 who catch Crown Royale will die from it. But here’s the big difference: those who are infected and recover will experience an overwhelming sense of well-being, community, and altruism. Will the euphoria last? Too early to tell. If it does last, will the benevolent effects on recoverees be good for society at large? Well, that’s complicated.

Billionaire software developer Blas Escobedo is devoting his wealth to finding a cure. So is Dame Glynis Havilland of the Havilland consortium, an eccentric grande dame with a world-class fortune. Dame Havilland is resigned to catching the virus and knows it will either kill her or turn her hard heart to sentimental slop. So she signs over her entire estate to Morgan Willmon-Wu, a rising star in the business world, and just as tough-minded as the old lady herself. Morgan will pursue the challenge of stopping the virus with the vast resources of Havilland Consortium.

Meanwhile, Escobedo’s youngest and best-beloved son Tiburón (Rón), has gone missing, and his father suspects the young man has caught the virus and recovered. True, but not before Rón meets Mariel, another teen who’s been living hand to mouth with her shiftless mother. As their relationship develops Mariel can’t understand or experience Rón’s euphoria, and isn’t sure that she should.

“Darkness is there for a reason,” she said.

“Maybe the reason is to remind us why we need the light.”

The two will soon set across the United States on a mission that Rón feels called and specially equipped to complete.

Quite a setup. At 500+ pages, this is a hefty volume with a proliferation of characters and plot-twisty developments. The premise ensures some very interesting questions about human nature and potential. To recoverees, their happiness and self-sacrifice is what humans were intended to be all along, and maybe we’re finally getting it right. Christians inevitably see a religious angle: “If the Word could become flesh,” speculates one character, “who’s to say that the Word couldn’t also become a virus?” To the elites at the top, “Contentment is only of value when it serves the greater good, and when the government can be credited.” That’s the most cynical view, very close to Morgan’s. Escobedo’s is more nuanced: If some degree of dissatisfaction is necessary for human striving, wouldn’t stopping Crown Royale be the ultimate good?

Neal Schusterman can always be relied on to make readers think, all the way back to the Unwind series. He doesn’t come to conclusions, and All Better Now ends with a jarring development that seems to demand a sequel but probably won’t get one. Readers can make up their own minds about which is preferable: Universal brotherhood, with the risk that civilization will fall apart, or the drama and conflict that produces progress. Or is the contrast that stark?

Please note that language may be a deal-breaker for some readers. Shusterman is much more restrained than many YA authors, but All Better Now includes vulgar words, such as three f-bombs, and occasional misuses of divine names. It’s not that frequent, and doesn’t feel gratuitous, but readers be warned.

Considerations

• Language, as noted above.
• Implied intimacy between Mariel and Ron as they travel, but this is never explicit.

Bottom Line: A sci-fi thriller with high stakes and provocative questions.

Also at Redeemed Reader

• Reviews: Other YA novels by Neal Schusterman are the Scythe Trilogy andChallenger Deep.
• Reflection: Betsy’s thoughts on The Need for Science Fiction.  

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