Review: As Easy as Falling off the Face of the Earth (Perkins)

Title: As Easy as Falling off the Face of the Earth
Author: Lynne Rae Perkins
Genre: YA fiction
Pages: 352
Rating: 3.5 out of 5
Challenges: YA
FTC Disclosure: I got this book for my Birthday and am donating it to my school's library
Summary (from the inside flap): Train. Car. Plane. Boat. Feet. He'll get there. Won't he?

Review: Hmm. This book was recommended to me by one of the YA people at my favorite bookstore. She loved it and said it was a good YA book that boys like. I'm not a teenaged boy, maybe that's the problem, but I don't think so. This book isn't bad, it just didn't really do it for me. I ended up skipping a lot of it so that I could finish it.

That makes the book sound terrible and it wasn't; it just isn't my kind of book. And, the summary really doesn't tell you what it's about. Ry is 16 and is on a train on his way to summer camp. When the train stops in a small town he gets off the train to make a phone call and climbs up a hill to get better reception (more bars). As he is doing this the train leaves the station. The book is the story of Ry's adventure as he tries to get ahold of his family (grandpa is staying at Ry's house, but has an accident and Ry's parents are on a vacation in the Caribbean and have lost their cell phone).

Ry's adventure should seem improbable, but it doesn't, which I liked. Ry meets up with Del who goes on the adventure with him, trying to find his way home and, later, to find his parents. The author could have made this book creepy with Del being a psychopath, but she didn't and for that I am glad. While I worried for Ry and wanted him to make it home, I never worried for his safety or that the people he met would do him harm. This book shows that there are good people out there who are generous and willing to help.

I usually avoid looking at reviews of books until I am finished writing my own because I don't want to accidently use someone else's ideas or words in my review. But for this book I am interested in what others thought: delightful, warm, fun, well written, a definite read. So, there you have it. I am in the minority as others really enjoyed this book.

Have you read this book? What did you think?