Book Review: ALONE by Megan E. Freeman

 Do you like solitude? Being alone? The kind of alone where even if you scream, no one else will answer. What would you do if you were the only person in your part of the world? All you have for company is an old dog and the natural world. A world that can be friendly and welcoming one minute, and a scary disaster the next.

ALONE by Megan E. Freeman asks these questions and more. It is an edge-of-your-seat adventure bound to have kids wondering how they'd fare if suddenly found alone. Here's the blurb for this engaging middle grade book.

Perfect for fans of Hatchet and the I Survived series, this harrowing middle grade debut novel-in-verse from a Pushcart Prize–nominated poet tells the story of a young girl who wakes up one day to find herself utterly alone in her small Colorado town.

When twelve-year-old Maddie hatches a scheme for a secret sleepover with her two best friends, she ends up waking up to a nightmare. She’s alone—left behind in a town that has been mysteriously evacuated and abandoned.

With no one to rely on, no power, and no working phone lines or internet access, Maddie slowly learns to survive on her own. Her only companions are a Rottweiler named George and all the books she can read. After a rough start, Maddie learns to trust her own ingenuity and invents clever ways to survive in a place that has been deserted and forgotten.

As months pass, she escapes natural disasters, looters, and wild animals. But Maddie’s most formidable enemy is the crushing loneliness she faces every day. Can Maddie’s stubborn will to survive carry her through the most frightening experience of her life?

 Here's my review: 

A scary, but thought-provoking middle grade novel in verse about what it means to be alone. Relying on oneself not only for basic survival with food, water, and shelter. But also being alone with your own thoughts, feelings, voice. How do you keep hope alive? How do you find inner strength and resolve? How do you keep on going? This book is guaranteed to encourage these soul-searching questions as Maddie – the twelve-year-old left behind when a town is completely evacuated – comes to terms with all that being alone means. A fast-paced, page-turner that will have readers contemplating what they might do under the same circumstances. Highly recommended.

 

Darlene Beck Jacobson has often been alone for short periods of time. She would not want to experience what Maddie did and would miss music and lunch with family and friends most of all.