This Is Not a Test

by Courtney Summers

Overview

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE DIRECTED BY ADAM MACDONALD AND STARRING OLIVIA HOLT

 

The Breakfast Club meets 28 Days Later in this revised and expanded edition of Courtney Summers’s cult classic about a traumatized young woman forced to survive the zombie apocalypse.

 

Sloane Price knows there are worse things than the end of the world, so when the zombie apocalypse happens, the opportunity to escape her violent home life offers no relief. She’s already lost the one thing that matters most—her sister—and now seems like the perfect time to give up.

 

But when she inadvertently ends up barricaded in her high school with five other teens, their desperate and volatile bids for survival force a series of impossible decisions. As the days creep by and the dead close in, Sloane must confront everything she thought she knew about life, death, survival, and sacrifice and—once and for all—make a choice.

 

Joined together for the first time in this special “director’s cut” edition, This Is Not a Test and its novella sequel Please Remain Calm explore the forces that tether us to life—and to each other—in our darkest times.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781967967124
Publisher:	Bindery Books
Publication date:	03/31/2026
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 1.25(h) x 9.00(d)
Age Range:	13 - 17 Years

About the Author

Courtney Summers is the bestselling and critically acclaimed author of several novels for young adults, including Cracked Up to Be, All the Rage and Sadie. Her work has been released to multiple starred reviews, received numerous awards and honors—including the Edgar Award, John Spray Mystery Award, Cybils Award, Odyssey Award, and International Thriller Award—and has been recognized by many library, 'Best Of' and Readers' Choice lists. She lives and writes in Canada.

Read an Excerpt

SEVEN DAYS LATER

 

 

“Get the door! Get the tables against the fucking door, Trace—move!”

In a perfect world, I’m spinning out. I’m seven days ago, sleeping myself into nothingness. Every breath in and out is shallower than the last until, eventually, I stop. In a perfect world, I’m over. I’m dead. But in this world, Lily took the pills with her and I’m still alive. I’m climbing onstage before Cary notices and gives me something to do even though I should be doing something. I should help. I should be helping because seconds are critical. He said this over and over while we ran down streets, through alleys, watched the community center fall, hid out in empty houses and he was right—seconds are critical.

You can lose everything in seconds.

“Harrison, Grace, take the front! Rhys, I need you in the halls with me—”

I slip past the curtain. I smell death. It’s all over me but it’s not me, not yet. I am not dead yet. I run my hands over my body, feeling for something that doesn’t belong. We were one street away and they came in at all sides with their arms out, their hands reaching for me with the kind of sharp-teethed hunger that makes a person—them. Cary pulled me away before I could have it, but I thought—I thought I felt something, maybe—

“Sloane? Where’s Sloane?”

I can’t reach far enough behind my back.

“Rhys, the halls—”

“Where is she?”

“We have to get in the halls now!”

“Sloane? Sloane!”

I look up. Boxy forms loom overhead, weird and ominous. Stage lights. And I don’t know why but I dig my cell phone out of my pocket and I dial Lily. If this is it, I want her to know. I want her to hear it. Except her number doesn’t work anymore, hasn’t worked since she left, and I don’t know how I forgot that. I can’t believe I forgot that. Instead of Lily, that woman’s voice is in my ear: Listen closely. She sounds familiar, like someone’s mother. Not my mother. I was young when she died. Lily was older. Car accident …

“Sloane!” Rhys pushes the curtain back and spots me. I drop the phone. It clatters to the floor. “What the hell are you doing? We’ve got to move—” He takes in the look on my face and his turns to ash. “Are you bit? Did you get bitten?”

“I don’t know—” I unbutton my shirt and pull it off and I know he sees all of me before I can turn away, but I don’t care. I have to know. “I can’t see anything—I can’t feel it—”

Rhys runs his hands over my back, searching for telltale marks. He murmurs prayers under his breath while I hold mine.

“It’s okay—you’re good—you’re fine—you’re alive—”

The noises in the auditorium get louder with the frantic scrambling of people who actually want to live, but I’m still.

I’m good, I’m fine.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure—now come on—come on, we have to—”

Good, fine. I’m fine. I’m fine, I’m fine. He grabs my arm. I shrug him off and put my shirt back on more slowly than I should. I am fine. I’m alive.

I don’t even know what that means.

“Look, we’ve got to get back out there,” he says as I do up my buttons. “There are three other doors that need to be secured—” He grabs my arm and turns me around. “Look at me—are you ready? Sloane, are you ready?”

I open my mouth but nothing comes out.

 

Copyright © 2012 by Courtney Summers

Editorial Reviews

This Is Not a Test is both sexy and desolate, and it will blast a hole through your heart, yet somehow start to stitch it back together again” —Daisy Whitney, author of The Mockingbirds and The Rivals

“Courtney Summers is a ferocious talent in YA fiction. This Is Not a Test brought me to tears, caused me to gasp in shock in public places, and almost put a stop to my heart . . . Summers' voice is raw with emotion, and utterly right for the impending zombie apocalypse.” —Nova Ren Suma, author of Imaginary Girls

“[Courtney Summers] blends all the perfection and simplicity that defines her writing so well with this added paranormal element for a snappy, exciting story I just couldn't stop reading, and then I got to the very end and realized that it was about so much more than just making it out alive.” —Julie Cross, author of Tempest

“Intriguing.... It takes some artistic guts to set a portrayal of a suicidal teenager amid attacking zombies, but Summers has a history of risky choices.... Unusual and absorbing.” —Kirkus

From the Publisher

A girl wants to commit suicide, but she's caught in the zombie apocalypse with a group that's trying to survive in this intriguing psychological thriller. It takes some artistic guts to set a portrayal of a suicidal teenager amid attacking zombies, but Summers has a history of risky choices (Fall for Anything, 2010, etc.). Sloane was left trapped in her severely abusive home when her older sister, Lily, escaped. When the zombies attack, Sloane joins a group of her fellow students who take refuge in their high school, a building built almost like a prison. They barricade the doors and live off food from the cafeteria and water stored on the roof. Yet, although the zombie threat keeps tension high, Summers' focus remains on Sloane and the group of teens hiding in the school. The teen suffers from the betrayal she feels from Lily, while the others jockey for dominance and squabble over perceived ills done to them by others in the group. As events proceed, the teens make real decisions about life and death, while Sloane looks toward a possible reunion with Lily. Readers never learn why zombies attacked; they are kept in the moment by Sloane's first-person, present-tense account. The focus stays on the personalities and on Sloane's struggle with her emotions and her own decision to live or to die. Unusual and absorbing. (Paranormal suspense. 12 & up)

Kirkus Reviews