This book, by Peg Kehret, is one of the nominees for the 2012 Nutmeg Award for grades 4 - 6. It has to be one of the most terrifying books I have ever read. I am curious whether others will agree. Is this book so scary to me because I'm a mom, and will the parts I find most terrifying not cause even a blip for a 4th grader? Or will they find the parts that I find a little too unbelievable the most scary?
Here's the basic premise of the book: Amy, a 14-year-old girl, takes a babysitting job. While there, she and the 3-year-old she is babysitting are kidnapped. The rest of the book deals with Amy's attempts to escape. These attempts are complicated by the fact that she won't leave the 3-year-old behind.
Amy had previously disappointed her parents by failing to follow through on a pet-sitting job for a neighbor. When the neighbor told her father, her father returned to the house to talk with Amy about it and thus was late leaving the house for work. Then a driver ran a red light and killed her father. So Amy feels guilty:
1. If her father hadn't been late because of her, he would have been through the intersection and wouldn't be dead.
2. Her last word's to her father - "You aren't perfect."
3. Her father's last words to her - "I'm ashamed of you."
So now we have a widow with her only child kidnapped and the parents of a 3-year-old whose child was kidnapped. This is the stuff of nightmares for parents, as are those last words.
As someone who can vividly remember Hitchcock stories read when I was in elementary school, I wonder if this book will give kids nightmares. What do you think?
