Clade, by James Bradley

Set in a dystopian future, beginning not too far from now, the effects of cataclysmic climate change on a planet and on a particular extended family are seen in snapshots over a span of around 50 years. Grimly realistic and all too believable, the novel shows the day-to-day reality of the impact of the changing climate on ordinary people and the society they inhabit. Despite it all they continue to live, love, breed and hope, reflecting the truth of the title, which is a reference to the tree of life. Individual characters are not especially appealing, but they are mere cogs in the overall machine of a crisply-written and gripping tale. Books written in the present tense can often be intensely annoying, but here it is less so and as the story continues it actually seems quite apt, when the future depicted is increasingly uncertain.