Hannah Crowley

Hannah Crowley
Lock and Key
Sarah Dessen
Realistic Fiction
Holiday
pg. 32

1. This book is about a girl named Ruby who is 17 years old. She lives with her mother in, what she calls, the Yellow House. However, one day she wakes up and her mother had left without leaving a note or any evidednce as to where she had gone. Ruby thought "If only I could keep people thinking that she's still here for a few months until I'm eighteen when I'll legally be allowed to be living alone.". This was a very difficult thing to do seeing as her pesty landlords checked in all the time, but they weren't used to seeing her mother to often anyway. The plan was working out fine until one day a social worker came knocking and asked to speak with her mother and that's when Ruby knew she wouldn't be able to hide it anymore. Once everything was discussed and worked out Ruby was told that she was going to live with her sister, who she hadn''t seen in ten years. Now she's trying to decide whether or not she wants to stay with her uptight sister and her laid back husband or sneak away and find somewhere else to live. When Jamie, her sister's husband, catches her trying to runaway in the middle of the night she decides she'll stay for a little while.

2. So far, this book is pretty intriguing. I haven't read much of it, but up to the part that I'm at it hasn't been torture. I heard about this book from one of my friends who isn't the biggest fan of reading so I knew that it must be fairly good and because of that I can't wait to read more. I've also enjoyed this novel because Ruby's life differs from mine so greatly that it's quite interesting to read about.

3. A theme I have noticed is overcoming your past. First, Ruby's mother, an alcohol and minor drug addict, leaves her even though Ruby is the only good thing she has in life. Then, when Ruby gets the opportunity to start her life over, live in a nice home, and get a great education, she tries to runaway from it all and go back to her old life instead of making the best of what she has in front of her. I think in both of these situations the only thing the people knew was were pasts and they were trying to hang on to them rather than overcoming them and moving on with their lives.

4. My favorite character so far would have to be Nate. He is Ruby's new neighbor at her sister's house. I like him because he seems like the cool, nice guy who is going to become the best friend who is always has your back. I don't know much about him yet but I'm very curious to find out more.

5. My least favorite character at the moment would probably be Cora, Ruby's sister. Cora is very uptight, she's a perefectionist. She seems like she would be one of the most annoying people to live with because if you accidentally broke or spilled something she would get extremely upset. One good part about her though is that she doesn't tend to yell, or at least not yet she hasn't.

6. I think that Ruby is going to start to accept her new life and start just going with the flow. I also think that Nate is going to become her best friend and he's going to show her all the ropes of her new school and everything. However, I'm going to predict that in the first couple of weeks that Ruby is living with her sister they are going to bang heads, hard. I have a feeling that they aren't going to enjoy each other's company at all.