Customer Reviews

How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"...Just one look inside this strange house--that was all I wanted.

"Do you know that feeling of doing something and at the same time of watching yourself? It's like watching a movie but you are the movie. And you're watching yourself talk and walk, but the whole time you're holding your breath and thinking, What is she going to do next? ...

"Scary" and "exciting" were the adjectives my ten-year-old son, Alex, used in explaining to me why he's read 100+ pages each of the past two days--... The book that's got him totally enthralled is HOW TO DISAPPEAR COMPLETELY AND NEVER BE FOUND. I have to agree with Alex: from the book's opening moments--narrated by twelve-year-old Margaret--we are dropped squarely into an exciting and suspenseful tale:

"Most stories start at the beginning, but I really can't say I know where that is. Is it a falling-down mansion on a small island in the Pacific Northwest, or in the navy blue pickup truck making its way to that mansion? Does it start on a sunny day this year, or on a sunny day twenty years before? Is it with me, or with a young boy who, a long, long time ago, believed he was turning into a rat? I guess the only thing I really do know is where it started for me--in that navy blue pickup heading toward a place I didn't know existed. A place that had already changed my life."

The illustrations are an innovative and integral part of the book. They are snippets of Ratt, a comic series for which there is only one hand-drawn copy per issue. Those issues of Ratt appear regularly and mysteriously at the Island's library--a rather unique institution that carries only unpublished manuscripts, apparently all submitted by the Island's residents:

"Under D was not one novel by Dickens. H had no Hawthorne and F had no Frost. There was no Hemingway or Fitzgerald, no Eliot or Kuo. Instead they found stack after stack of handmade books. Some were typed, some were scribbled, some were printed out on cheap computer paper, some were stapled, some had brads, some were held together with twine.

" 'The unpublished works of Everyman,' exclaimed Mr. Librarian proudly. 'Everywoman and Everykid, too.' "

Boyd, the boy who lives next to that eerie mansion, has long been the devoted fan of Ratt. He and Margaret, who arrives in her mother's navy blue pickup, and the comic book series with a life of its own become entangled in the mysteries of the mansion and of the death of Margaret's father four years earlier. They are surrounded by quirky characters such as Mr. Librarian, Margaret's funny and exasperating little sister Sophie, and their mom, who has been barely coping since her husband's disappearance.

HOW TO DISAPPEAR COMPLETELY AND NEVER BE FOUND is a haunting and fun find for middle grade readers.

...

I was quick to judge this book by its eirie cover. I am a lover of Sci-Fi and Fantasy, but this book intrigiued me from the moment I picked it up. It is told in 3rd person unlimited formatt, written from the alternating views of both twelve year old Margaret, and Boyd, a boy who lives next to a mansion owned by Margaret's family. Boyd is an avid reader of the Ratt comics, which he picks up from the odd little Library in town. They are based on the life of the main character Ratt, who supposedly resides in the creepy mansion next to Boyds house. It all starts when Margaret and her deeply depressed mother Lizzie and her annoyingly hyperactive sister Sophie arrive at the mansion with a for sale by owner sign in the back of their blue pickup.

I gave the book 5 stars for enjoyment. This is a fun book.

The author has given us many ways in which to see the characters and the story, by using different narratives (including the anonymous editor) and letting us get a taste of the wonderful Rat Man comic strip. I didn't find this method of switching back and forth confusing at all. I read this book as fast as I could to get to the end: to understand the mystery of the Rat Man.
I really rooted for the kids in this story. It is definitely a book about the underdog. It is also about friendship. And the power of imagination. It was very clever little book. If I had read it when I was 12, I would probably have wanted to be Rat Man, too.

I don't know how a person could do anything but LOVE this book. It keeps kids on the edge of their seats and begging to hear just one more page.. ok one more... no one more.... more.......

Reminiscent of The Twilight Zone and told in both text and graphic novel format, How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found is a surprisingly fun read. The story is quite complex, but the quirky characters help usher the book along. The one thing this book might have benefited from is a character list as sometimes it's hard to keep track of the story. Nevertheless, HtDCaNBF was very satisfying and fun to read.

Have you ever met people who do the same thing EVERY day? Well, the three protagonists in How to Disappear Completely and Never be Found, Lizzie, and her daughters, Margaret and Sophie, have had the same routine every day, week, and year since Margaret and Sophie's dad drowned. On one Saturday, though things changed. Lizzie broke that rhythm and took her daughters to an island but did not tell them why. They bought a For Sale by Owner sign and went to an old run down mansion that they owned. Sophie wanted to live in the house not sell it. In the house next door lives Boyd who is in love with the mysterious comics that show up in middle of the night. Margaret finds a package addressed to her mother with some weird things in it, including the first book of the comics. What is really weird though is that Boyd has every comic published except the first one. Margaret sneaks back into the house and finds out more things about her father, the comics, and herself. The surprising turns in this story will keep you on your toes, waiting for more.
Overall I really liked this book. It was a real page turner. Every other chapter was either narrated by Boyd or Margaret. You really wanted to read faster and faster because you felt you just had to see what happened to Sophie, Margaret or Boyd. I also like this book because there are so many details about setting, character, and speech that you feel like you are right there, in the mansion, scared out of your wits just like Margaret or running from the dark woods with Boyd. On the other hand though some details sometimes didn't make sense. Sometimes there were too many details to sort out so you could not understand. For example there were a couple characters that didn't need to be there and just made the book more confusing. Otherwise I really liked this book.

As a middle school teacher in Florida, I actually had my students read all 15 Sunshine State Recommended Books (6-8) last year and HOW TO DISAPPEAR... was among them. I read all these books first to be one "up" on the students and this was the first book I read because the cover art was very intriguing to me.

The book itself is "good" -- focusing on a strong protagonist girl who seems like a realistic young teen. Her family relationships seemed a little bit contrived for storytelling purposes, but then the whole plotline is a bit too contrived. The worst aspect of the book is most definitely the small town "library" which only contains homemade books and is run by an exceptionally odd librarian. However, in order to tell this story, it needed to be there to make the story work, hence, the contrivance.

There are, on the other hand, many strengths to this novel: beautiful pacing, strong narrative approach to reveal the mystery in layers, well-written scenes of tension, and a lovely bit of a twist that I will not reveal.

I would recommend this book as a 4-star YA "realistic" mystery (considered realistic ONLY is you can stretch the definition of "realistic" a bit). It will be interesting to see what Sara Nickerson comes up with next.

I really like the story, and I am glad they have
added this to a 7th grade approved list. My daughter
is also enjoying the book

Do you like mystery/scary type books? If so, keep reading. This book is about two sisters who don't know what happened to their dad. Margaret the older one finds a package for her mom. She opens it and there was a comic book,a key, and a championship swimming medal.
She starts to read the comic book and finds out a few things. First she finds out that the key is to a house. She also finds out that the championship swimming medal was her dads.What her mom always said to Sophie and her was that their dad drowned. Sophie by the way is Margaret's little sister. If their dad drowned then why does he have a championship swimming medal? But her dad really did drown. He got pulled under by a scuba diver.If you are interested in this book then go to your local library and check it out.

Blake L.

This is a very interesting and mysterious book about Margaret who is determined to solve the mystery of her fathers death. Her father drowned mysteriously and her mom ,Lizzie, chain smokes and sleeps most of the time and doesn't talk about dad. Margaret lives in an apartment in the Pacific northwest. She has a sister, Sophie, who is obsessed with `The Hardest Jigsaw Puzzle Ever Made'. Margaret's life is very boring until she meets Tina Louise who becomes her friend and inspires her to go to the strange mansion on the island where she found an unopened, mysterious package addressed to her mom four years ago. Margaret eventually listens to her, and after convincing Sophie she goes to the island to solve the mystery of her fathers death.

I really like this book and I think it will be interesting for ages 9-14. I like mystery books and I especially like this one because of the way it's written. It has a lot of mystery in it and it keeps you wanting to read more. I like how the author describes the scenes using a lot of adjectives. I also like this book because it has comedy in it. My favorite scene was when Margaret was playing baseball during her PE class and Tina Louise got hit with a baseball
right on the head. She was unconscious for a while and during that time she peed her pants and then opened her eyes and started crying. I liked this book a lot and if you're somebody who's thinking about reading this book you'll like it a lot.