Trapped Book Review

Trapped by Michael Northrup

When Scotty Weems agrees to stay at school during a snowstorm with his friends, he has no idea what a huge mistake he has made. At first he and the other six students are hopeful, sure that their parents are on the way and soon they will all be home, warm in their beds. But the snow doesn't stop and no one is coming. Worse yet, they are all certain no one knows they are at the school. As the snow continues to grow, becoming the largest snowstorm on record, Scotty comes face to face with his own mortality and wonders if he has what it takes to be a survivor.

When I was a kid, there was a game I used to play whenever it snowed, and that was that the snow wouldn't stop and if we had to find ways of surviving. I would play this game for hours on end in the snow, digging tunnels and imaging the looting that would happen by me as I searched for warm clothes. Or how would I stay warm if the electricity shut off. We had a fireplace, so I was fairly confident that we would not freeze to death although we may have to burn the encyclopedias in the living room.

As such, I thought this story was well imagined. Seven kids stuck in a school together? Where do you get blankets, food, water? While things are less dire, the social clicks, whispering girls, and posturing are ever present, but when it becomes about survival those things are forgotten. Almost. Here's a question...if you could eat anything in the school cafeteria, would you still not eat the mystery meat?

There was the right amount of suspense and drama, teen angst and friendship to really give this story a heartbeat. As the snow keeps falling, filling the windows and entombing its inhabitants, the reader feels the same dark oppression and you find yourself turning the page just a little faster. In the end Scotty made me wonder, what would I have done if I had been in a similar situation?