Trapped

Trapped (ARC)

Author: Michael Northrup

Publisher: Scholastic Press

Pages: 231

Read Time: Didn’t finish, stopped at page 70

Rating (1-5): 1

Tag Words: snow storm, narrated from male perspective, Contemp Author book, high school, death

My Summary:

One snowstorm, a deserted high school, and seven Trapped students. Only a few will make it out alive.

My Review:

No, I didn’t finish this book, as you old readers know, I still review the books I don’t finish because, obviously, not finishing a book means I didn’t like it. Those are books I won’t recommend and the name of this blog is not “Sugar-Coated Positivity At All Times.” So I didn’t like Trapped. Here are the reasons.

I could not get into this book at all.

There was nothing that captivated me. I began skimming around page 40 to try and move the plot along and get to the pieces that made the storm terrifying, and not confusing. I never skim books, ever. I read all the “between the dialogue” bits. I don’t think I can recall a time I read over part of a book. I am the kind of girl who will go back and read a sentence that I accidentally skimmed just to make sure I am taking in every word.

I don’t think Northrup is a bad writer; grammatically, he’s fine, but as a storyteller he really turned me off.

The story is narrated by Scotty, and I couldn’t tell you anything about this boy, other than he is a boy, and he likes one of the girls who is Trapped with him at their high school. I had to go back and re-read the synopsis to get his name. He bored me and none of the other students got a chance to tell their way of seeing things. Nothing Scotty said really struck me as profound, or note-worthy, thus the skipping and the skimming.

I always recommend that readers read books I don’t like, because we are all different. I disagree with people that books are good or bad; it’s all in the soul of a reader. So no, I’m not telling you not to read this book, just why I didn’t like it.

Notes on the Names: Bad names. Boring, bad names I couldn’t even remember as I said.

Thoughts on the Cover: This cover really does not scream “commercial” or “YA” to me. And besides being a bit boring, I think the editing lacked a lot of contrast and intrigue. I would have used a blacklight, not a bluetone while editing.