Book Review: On The Island by Tracey Garvis Graves

Book: 59/150

Review: 4/5

Summary: When thirty-year-old English teacher Anna Emerson is offered a job tutoring T.J. Callahan at his family's summer rental in the Maldives, she accepts without hesitation; a working vacation on a tropical island trumps the library any day.

T.J. Callahan has no desire to leave town, not that anyone asked him. He's almost seventeen and if having cancer wasn't bad enough, now he has to spend his first summer in remission with his family—and a stack of overdue assignments—instead of his friends.

Anna and T.J. are en route to join T.J.'s family in the Maldives when the pilot of their seaplane suffers a fatal heart attack and crash-lands in the Indian Ocean. Adrift in shark-infested waters, their life jackets keep them afloat until they make it to the shore of an uninhabited island. Now Anna and T.J. just want to survive and they must work together to obtain water, food, fire, and shelter.

Their basic needs might be met but as the days turn to weeks, and then months, the castaways encounter plenty of other obstacles, including violent tropical storms, the many dangers lurking in the sea, and the possibility that T.J.'s cancer could return. As T.J. celebrates yet another birthday on the island, Anna begins to wonder if the biggest challenge of all might be living with a boy who is gradually becoming a man.

Thoughts: I can always appreciate a book that gets me out of a slump. I reached out to a friend with recommendations and she shared this one, and I'm glad she did!

What I liked:

• Lost is one of my all time favourite television shows, so I tend to like plane crash combined with a survival stories

• The characters were very likable, and their relationship (acquaintances to friends to lovers) was very organic

• I liked the ending... I felt it was realistic

Other thoughts:

• There isn't much that I didn't like now that I think about it.... I'm not one that's fond of inappropriate relationships between someone super young and way older.... but I felt that given their situation (and they didn't 'get together' until he was 19) I feel like given the circumstances you are bound to fall in love with someone you are deserted on an island with. I thought the author did a great job

• The writing was easy to read but nothing spectacular

I always have a soft spot for books that get me out of a slump. I have really been struggling with how I review books lately. At first I gave this one a 3... but I'm bumping it up to a 4. It's an easy romance read with an unusual setting.