As Easy as Falling Off the Face of the Earth

Gr 5—8—When Ry steps off the train in Montana to make a phone call, he unwittingly starts a chain of events that no one could have predicted in this novel (Greenwillow, 2010) by Lynne Rae Perkins. Ry is on his way from Wisconsin to a summer camp in Montana after a hectic week of moving to a new town and saying goodbye to his parents who left for a Caribbean vacation. When Ry finally reads his mail and discovers that camp has been cancelled, he gets off the train to try to get better cell phone reception. But the train unexpectedly pulls away, leaving Ry stranded in the middle of nowhere. Ry starts walking and stops at the first house he sees with someone outside. Del offers to drive Ry back to Wisconsin, and everything that could possibly go wrong on this trip does. The pair goes from Wisconsin to Florida to the Caribbean looking for Ry's parents. Ry's grandfather, who was supposed to be dog and house sitting for the family, had a mishap on the first day and has been missing ever since. Chris Sorenson captures Perkins's quirky sense of humor and dry wit, reading with perfect comedic timing. Each person that the pair meets on their adventures is unique and eccentric, and Sorenson gives each one a different personality. This laugh-out-loud, clever story is a must-have and would be perfect to use in creative writing classes.—Wendy Woodfill, Hennepin County Library, Minnetonka, MN