From School Library Journal
Grade 6-10. Toby Chase's life has been a series of different schools and towns. He and his mother never have a phone or credit cards, and she constantly changes her hair color, job, and their last name. Now a teenager, Toby is resentful of her refusal to respond to his questions and he begins pressing her for answers. It is while working on a research paper for his new school in rural Idaho, however, that he finally uncovers the truth, via the Internet, that his mother is wanted by the FBI for her radical activities as a college student during the Vietnam War era. This time, when she must move on, Toby refuses to go, and he is left in the care of his mother's employer and would-be sweetheart, Sam Wilder. In the end, she turns herself in. When her lawyer discovers that her group was framed by a secret government agency, the story has a happy ending and Toby gets a bright beginning. All of the characters are well developed, but Toby is especially real and likable, which makes his habit of stealing rather disconcerting, and his longing for "people" and a past heartbreaking. Plot points are passed on through unobtrusive inner musings, and the pacing will keep readers moving along. Ryan does a great job of alternating the tension of life on the run with the precious patches of normalcy and calm that Sam brings to Toby's life. She doesn't do anything clever with images or language, but she competently tells a story that puts a personal face on events that have cropped up in the news over the past few years.?Patricia A. Dollisch, DeKalb County Public Library, Decatur, GA
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Gr. 6^-10. Taut and suspenseful, this is both an exciting mystery and a poignant coming-of-age story. At 15, Toby Chase doesn't ask why he and his mother are always moving. He has always accepted her restless lifestyle, crisscrossing the country. He knows she loves him, and they have a great time together as long as he follows the rules: no personal questions. Then they come to Donner, Idaho; he likes it there and begins to make friends--and to uncover his mother's history. Toby's casual, contemporary narrative voice will have readers racing to the climax, but, unfortunately, the jacket flap gives away the secret (she is a political fugitive from a 1960s antiwar conspiracy), and the final few pages are cluttered and contrived to make a happy ending. Yet the people and places are drawn with beautiful economy. As in Ehrlich's
Where It Stops, Nobody Knows (1988), the child's loving bond with the fugitive parent is at the center of the story, and the excitement of the chase is infused with the longing for home.
Hazel Rochman
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
