[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/no_safety_in_numbers.png]]
''No Safety in Numbers'' is a {{young adult}} novel by Dayna Lorentz published in 2012, the first book in a planned series. On a Saturday afternoon in October, an unknown terrorist releases [[ThePlague a biological weapon]] into the ventilation shafts of the Shops at Stonecliff, a {{suburb|ia}}an [[TheMall mega-mall]] in [[UsefulNotes/NewYorkState Westchester County, New York]]. The mall is put under quarantine, trapping thousands of shoppers inside.

Among those shoppers are four teenagers. Marco Carvajal is a working-class Costa Rican kid who works as a busboy at the Grill-n-Shake. Alexandra "Lexi" Ross is the nerdy, computer-whiz daughter of Senator Dorothy "Dotty" Ross, attending the mall with her parents for Chinese food and a movie. Ryan Murphy ([[Series/{{Popular}} no]], [[Series/NipTuck not]] [[Series/{{Glee}} that]] [[Series/AmericanHorrorStory one]]) is a LovableJock from West Nyack High School, running an errand for his older brother Thad (the star quarterback) and hanging out with his decidedly [[JerkJock less lovable]] teammates Mike and Drew. Shaila "Shay" Dixit is an artsy Indian theater/poetry geek who is out shopping with her grandmother (or "Nani") and her little sister Preeti. For the four of them and everyone else, the fun of having an entire shopping mall to themselves soon gives way to food shortages, fights, agitation, gang violence, rioting, and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking disgusting bathrooms]]. And the four of them are among the only ones who know the truth about what is happening...

!!Tropes present in this work:
%%* AlphaBitch: Maddie.
%%* BlackAndNerdy: Lexi.
* ClosedCircle: The authorities did a great job of making sure that ''nothing'' is getting out of that mall. The main doors? Blocked off with sandbags. The parking garage? Blocked off with walls [[spoiler:thick enough to stop a Chevy Suburban in its tracks]]. The roof? [[spoiler:Cops and helicopters.]] And that's not even counting the walls in the parking lot meant to keep the crowds outside from getting ''in''. Eventually, Ryan and his group simply say "screw it" and try to find a jackhammer to bust a hole through the wall.
* DCupDistress: Lexi resents the lustful attention that she gets from her male classmates due to her developed figure.
* DisgustingPublicToilet: With the nighttime janitorial team unable to get into the mall, the public bathrooms turn into cesspits in the course of two days, forcing the authorities to recruit shoppers to work as janitors. The manager at the Grill-n-Shake turns his restaurant's bathroom into a pay toilet so that it doesn't suffer the same fate.
** Not to mention that Lexi realizes early on that the bathrooms make for great vectors for infection.
* DisproportionateRetribution: Mike's reaction to Marco scratching his car with his bike is to try to run Marco over in the parking garage.
%%* GamerChick: Lexi.
* InformedAttribute: The fact that Lexi and her family are black is only mentioned once in the entire book.
* JerkJock: Mike and Drew, who are introduced trying to run over Marco simply for [[DisproportionateRetribution scratching Drew's BMW with his bike]]. They get better, though. The rival players from Tarrytown are a more clear-cut example, giving Ryan a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown over the last game they played.
%%* LovableJock: Ryan.
* ManicPixieDreamGirl: Shay has [[IncrediblyLamePun shades]] of this with Ryan, introducing him to the work of Creator/RabindranathTagore and Creator/JaneAusten.
%%* MarriedToTheJob: Dotty.
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: If it weren't for Dotty not knowing the proper protocol for a bio-terror attack, the mall would've been evacuated like it should have been rather than quarantined. [[spoiler:Subverted in the end, though; given the lethality of the virus, Dotty most definitely made the right call to seal off the building.]]
* NoEnding: The book makes no indication that it is the first in a series until the words "End of Book One" come up on the final page.
* NoFEMAResponse: Subverted initially, with the authorities trying to supply the quarantined shoppers with food, medicine and other supplies. Once they realize how deadly the virus is, however, they play it straight and seal off the building, letting the virus burn itself out.
* ThePlague: Specifically, a particularly lethal strain of influenza. [[spoiler:A-thousand-dead-in-one-week lethal.]]
* SexSignalsDeath: Implied. Lexi refuses to take part in the other teens' truth-or-dare game once it reaches the point where they're making out and having sex, given what she knows about the virus.
* ShrinkingViolet: Lexi. What few friends she had she was separated from after she was sent (against her will) to an elite private school, where she found herself unable to enter the social circles of classmates who had known each other since childhood.
* VoiceWithAnInternetConnection: Darren becomes this for Lexi.
* [[WhamEpisode Wham Chapter]]: Dotty's discovery of [[spoiler:the thousand-plus dead bodies in the ice rink]] at the end of book one.
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