Martha brilliantly welds two elements together: the awe of the national parks with the tension of a dystopia. Did you know that in 2024, a staggering 331 million people—the population of the entire United States—visited America’s 63 national parks. Making this possible are the people of the National Park Service. Daily, the people work hard in not only making sure park goers enjoy the outdoors; but that revere these wild places.  When it comes to novels, dystopian stories like 1984, Fahrenheit 451, and The Handmaid's Tale are the ultimate go-tos for cultural references. These stories are so magnetic because readers are drawn to the unsettling clarity these novels provide - an unflinching look at how far humanity can fall when comfort and control replace truth and connection. 

  Martha won’t seem like a dystopian tale, for it doesn’t take place in a ruined city or a collapsed society. Martha unfolds in a setting we already know and think is okay - our modern world. That’s what will grip the reader. Martha is our current world, slightly shifted. The transformation of a national park to a resort is a microcosm of our broader crisis—a society willing to destroy its most sacred spaces for profit and comfort. In the process, the loss of precious species like the passenger pigeon is replaced with: A national park is now a gated luxury lodge; Park rangers replaced by concierge and sales; The quiet hum of biodiversity drowned by the resort’s pools and golf course. 

Martha shows the loss isn’t just about the environment; it’s about what that loss is doing to humans. Our destruction and pollution of the natural world have led to a world dealing with an increasing number of children born with autism, allergies, and cancers. Because of this, in the most innocent of ways, through the conversations of its characters, it asks the urgent question: Are we truly benefiting from this trade-off?

Jackson’s adjustment to the new job and learning the details of the park's transformation is the dystopian act. Without wars or curfews, dictators or blackouts, Jackson and the reader will initially think everything is fine. Beneath it all, the loss of environment and species is a dystopian world. Totalitarian rule is replaced with the silent extinction of species and the irreversible damage to their habitat. 

This story also breaks ground in a genre that historically is urban-focused and white-centric. By centering diverse voices and perspectives in a natural setting, Martha brings overdue representation to dystopian fiction—and reminds us that environmental justice is a civil right that requires social justice to obtain. 

Ultimately, Martha challenges readers to think: If the most loved parts of our world can be bought, sold, and destroyed without protest, what else are we willing to lose? And when do we start to push back?