Safekeeping by Karen Hesse

With her parents' , teachers' & school administrators' blessings, Radley has been working as a volunteer in an Orphanage in post-earthquake Haiti.  While she is in Haiti, the President is assassinated and the American People's Party takes over the government of the U.S.   This new government comes down hard on the people"vigilante groups, police raids & looting abound.  Illnesses believed to have been conquered return because people are in close, unsanitary quarters.

Radley returns to her New England home town after she hears of what has happened, but her parents aren't at the airport to meet her.  Her phone isn't working.  Her credit card has been cancelled, because all phone lines are down.  She has none of  the required travel papers.  She decides to walk to her own home & hides there for a time - scurrying into the attic at the sound of police - than decides that she must walk even farther: to Quebec.

Another young woman, Celia, has joined Radley, & they find an abandoned schoolhouse in Quebec to survive until things calm down in the U.S., if not forever.   They are quietly helped by a benefactor known as Our Lady of the Barn.

This novel has political overtones, it is more about what Radley learns during her time on her own.  The biggest pluses of "Safekeeping" are Radley's thoughts about her parents.  All too often in YA books, parents are in there or aren't very good parents.  Radley has great parents, & she realizes that she didn't thank or appreciate them nearly enough.  Hopefully, "Safekeeping" will help teens see their parents in a new way.