The Boy in the Burning House [Paperback]

Tim Wynne-Jones (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 10 and up | Grade Level: 5 and up

An Edgar Award Winner

Two years after his father's mysterious disappearance, Jim Hawkins is coping -- barely. Underneath, he's frozen in uncertainty and grief. What did happen to his father? Is he dead or just gone? Then Jim meets Ruth Rose. Moody, provocative, she's the bad-girl stepdaughter of Father Fisher, Jim's father's childhood friend and the town pastor, and she shocks Jim out of his stupor when she tells him her stepfather is a murderer. "Don't you want to know who he murdered?" she asks. Jim doesn't. Ruth Rose is clearly crazy -- a sixteen-year-old misfit. Yet something about her fierce conviction pierces Jim's shell. He begins to burn with a desire for the truth, until it becomes clear that it may be more unsettling than he can bear. What is the real meaning of the strange prayers Father Fisher intones behind the door of his private sanctuary? Why does Ruth Rose suddenly disappear? And what really happened thirty years ago when a boy died in a burning house?

 

The Boy in the Burning House is the winner of the 2002 Edgar Award for Best Young Adult Mystery.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

From its opening scene, in which a teenage girl overhears her stepfather's creepy confessions, to its terrifying conclusion in a deserted mine shaft, Tim Wynne-Jones's The Boy in the Burning House has the magnetic energy of a well-crafted made-for-television thriller, without pausing for commercial breaks. Like the best of the TV thrillers, The Boy in the Burning House features a smiling, unredeemable villain: Father Fisher, who leads the Church of the Blessed Transfiguration in a remote farming community.

Fourteen-year-old Jim Hawkins's father, Hub, has disappeared, and Ruth Rose, the pastor's stepdaughter, tries to convince him that Fisher killed Hub. If that possibility isn't unsavory enough, Jim discovers that his dad and Fisher were both involved in a fire that killed another teenage boy 30 years before. It is the unraveling of this long-hidden mystery that gives The Boy in the Burning House its page-turning edginess. As Jim investigates his father's past, his memories of a gentle and morally upright father are twisted out of shape. "He felt like he was burning up," Wynne-Jones writes, "and there was a boy inside him hammering to get out into the air."

As the novel roars towards its conclusion, some of its psychological richness and narrative consistency are sacrificed to fast-paced action sequences. Fisher's midnight stalking of Jim and Ruth Rose is as terrifying as Jack Nicholson's frenzied house crawl in The Shining, but Wynne-Jones never fully explains how Fisher became a monster. The Boy in the Burning House is a great read, but one that starts to wobble like a house of cards once the thrills are over. --Lisa Alward --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Wynne-Jones (Stephen Fair) builds an action-packed thriller around the mysterious disappearance of a Canadian farmer. Although Hub Hawkins's body was never found, most members of his small community believe he committed suicide. His son, Jim, starts to suspect foul play, however, after a teenage acquaintance, "crazy" Ruth Rose, makes some startling accusations. She insists that her stepfather, Eldon Fisher, a highly respected minister, is really a murderer. In order to find out if the pastor was really responsible for his father's death, Jim must first dig into the past and solve another mystery involving a boy a childhood friend of both Hub and Eldon Fisher who died in a burning house. Beginning on an ominous note with Jim's fateful meeting with Ruby, this eerie novel grows darker with the revelation of each succeeding secret. While the roles of Father Fisher and his wild-spirited stepdaughter are somewhat over-dramatized, the protagonist's character remains authentic, and the swift-moving plot will keep the pages turning. Ages 10-up.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 10 and up
  
• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR) (September 8, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374408874
• ISBN-13: 978-0374408879
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,022,482 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Boy in the Burning House, January 13, 2001

By 

Nancy (London, Ontario, CANADA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Boy in the Burning House (Hardcover)

This book is already published in Canada. Both my 11 year old son and I read this book. It kept my son on the edge of his seat and I enjoyed it as well.

The story revolves around a 14 year old loner named Jim, whose father disappears under mysterious circumstances, and is presumed to have committed suicide. While the boy and his mother struggle with the day to day challenges that inevitably result, the boy meets up with Ruth Rose, a very unusual and erratic teen, who believes her stepfather is a murderer. Jim doesn't want to get involved in Ruth Rose's rantings, but he can't help but get drawn into the mystery.

Although the subject matter deals with some very heavy topics, the author manages to inject some humorous moments and plenty of suspense, which keep the story from becoming too intense for youthful readers. I thought the author did a commendable job exploring the topics of mental health and social acceptance.

I would highly recommend this book for anyone 11 and over.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The reader will be panting for breath., July 12, 2004

By 

A Customer (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Boy in the Burning House (Paperback)

Everyone in the tiny Canadian farming community knows that Ruth Rose, despite being the preacher's step-daughter, is a crazy-bad girl. So who is Jim Hawkins to say otherwise?

When Ruth Rose surprises Jim while he's taking down a beaver dam on his farm one day he thinks she's playing some sort of elaborate game on him. She has been spying on Jim and his mother for long enough to know both of their schedules. Freaky. Even freakier, Ruth-Rose insists that Jim's father, Hub, who's been missing for a year, is dead. And not just dead, murdered --- by Ruth Rose's step-father, Father Fisher, to be exact.

Jim doesn't want to believe Ruth Rose, but when the crazy-bad girl tells him about a fire that links Father and Hub, he begins to think that maybe Ruth Rose isn't completely insane in this case and that there may be a connection between the long-ago fire and his father's disappearance.

THE BOY IN THE BURNING HOUSE is a fast paced, thrilling ride that begins
quietly and builds intensity as the pages fly by. At its center, is Jim Hawkins, a completely average young guy who finds he can no longer place his faith in his knowledge of the world. And with only Ruth Rose to help him piece together all the mysteries, Jim feels as if he's gotten into something he can't control. He knows he must find the truth or he won't have a future.

Tim Wynne-Jones sets his tale in the most unlikely of places --- a quiet, isolated town in rural Ontario --- and plops the reader into boiling emotions and the swift moving currents of events both past and present. The result is a wild plot filled with suspense. The reader will be panting for breath as Jim gets caught up in a series of events he cannot fathom or control until the story ends!

--- Reviewed by Cassia Van Arsdale

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Boy in the Burning House, March 5, 2004

By 

Ben Phung (Cerritos, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Boy in the Burning House (Hardcover)

The Boy in the Burning House
By Tim Wynne-Jones

Summary:
Two years after his father mysteriously disappeared, Jim Hawkins' life is leading toward uncertainty and grief. He then meats this moody, punky stepdaughter of Father Fisher. She was known as Ruth Rose. She shocks him by telling him that his stepfather is a murderer. Jim of course was in denial, but Ruth Rose asks him this question, and that was all to arouse Jim's suspicion. In spite of his fear, he wants Rose to tell him the truth. As Jim gets closer to the truth everyday, danger is also closing in. Jim then must decide if this is worth it. Should he risk his life and find out what happened to his father or should he keep a sacred memory?

Why I liked this book:
I'm not very used to reading books about killing. I never would have thought it would be crime. It has been a long time for me when I have read a crime book, and it just sounded good to me. The books I'm used to are all science fiction, and it really has good suspense like "Don't you want to know who he murdered?" or when somebody sprayed these words "Father killed Hub" in anger red. It's just like an entire new taste to me when I was reading that crazy scaring book.

My favorite part of the book:
It was really at the end when Jim was captured, and had to escape out a mysterious, maze-like cave. I had predicted that Jim would get out of course, and would be like those good ending books. One thing that aroused my attention though was the action in the air. It had so many turns I was confused, but I really liked it even though I had to read it twice. This book took the breath out of me!