LitPick Review
Age at time of review - 11
Reviewer's Location -
Garden Ridge,
TX ,
United States
View MReg's profile
The Fountain family has faced endless grief within the last
couple of years and their future seems quite bleak as well.
First the children's mother died, after refusing treatment
for her fatal cancer so that she could give life to their
baby brother Tris. Then, just two years later their father
dies in a terrible accident leaving the four Fountain
children alone and parent less with only their self-involved
Aunt Cheryl left to care for them.
Within weeks the two Fountain daughters, Madison and Smithy
flee, one going to live with her godparents and the other
going to a boarding school hundreds of miles away. This
leaves Jack to be the strong one, the one to take care of
Tris, because Cheryl really only cares about herself and
home makeover shows on TV.
As Tris' third birthday approaches, Cheryl decides that she
is ready for fame and sells the family's soap-opera story to
a reality television producer and Jack knows that his life
is about to be thrown upside down once again. The thing is
though this event brings the family together again. Along
the way they find out some troubling information that makes
them question if the witness of their dad's death lie?
Opinion:
I believe if you looked Caroline B. Cooney up in an
encyclopedia you would find - author of heart-thudding
thrillers. I could literally not stop reading this book and
absolutely gobbled it up. The book as a whole was great, but
there were definitely some holes that I wish had been
patched up.
First of all, the plot was very original and was the driving
force behind the heart-thudding feeling you got while
reading the book. I loved how the author took a mystery and
turned it into a novel about family, friendship, trust,
loss, and love. These themes melded perfectly throughout the
book and really made the reader take a step back and
evaluate their own life in a different light. I did have a
couple issues with the plot though. Some of the events, such
as Cheryl gaining custody automatically over the children
and there being no original investigation into the fathers
death, were completely left out. This left a big gap for me
as I felt it could have been a crucial part in the story.
The storyline was also a bit predictable, but the suspense
created by the little details really helped the reader to
not focus on what was coming next.
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