Runaway by Wendelin Van Draanen

Runaway by Wendelin Van Draanen is fiction. Holly Janquell has no parents and landed in foster care. She is careless with school, because her teachers don’t keep anything to themselves when it comes to her. The teachers - especially Ms. Leone don’t trust Holly. I recommend this book to everyone. I believe the themes are to not take for granted of what we have and that no matter what happens someone will take you under their wing. I recommend Runaway to everyone because, the whole book is formatted as a journal written to Ms. Leone and I felt like I wrote it, everybody will surely feel like they are in her shoes. 

[SPOILER ALERT]

Holly used to have good foster parents until she started misbehaving. Her current foster parents, the Benders lock her in a laundry room. She decides to runaway for the second time (the first time was with her previous foster parent.) She faces the conflict within herself and everything else in order to survive. (Holly VS. Herself) (Holly VS. Society) (Holly VS. Nature) (Holly VS. Character.) Holly decides she is a sea gypsy- not a homeless person. She also comes close to the cops in a school, which she was living in during the summer. Holly finds many shelters and groups, but there always ends up being conflict between them. Her groups and shelters have included a cave, in which she almost ruined her notebook and drowned in. On her road of survival she finds ¨Hog’s¨ things and takes them. She gets into deep trouble with his group. She barely made it away from them, but she did. She builds herself a home in order to keep safe and stay away from the group, which includes a creepy stalker covered in snake tattoos named Martin. Holly almost had to move because Sammy from a soup kitchen Holly goes to followed her to her house with her friends. Which doesn’t matter much because Martin ends up crushing it later. Sammy got Meg and Vera to take Holly under their wing. (Meg and Vera work at a dog grooming place.) (Holly LOVES dogs.) They ended up keeping Holly forever by talking to social services. Meg showed Holly her journal and visa versa. Finally, Meg talked Holly into sending a copy to Ms. Leone.

Reviewed by Hailey ~ 6th Grade

Lexile 740