When twelve-year-old best friends Jocelyn and Alex head off for a late-summer, joint-family vacation in Wisconsin's isolated north woods, it's supposed to be a perfect week of hiking, tubing, campfire s'mores, and stargazing. Except for one big problem: Alex and Jocelyn are no longer friends.
Jocelyn secretly hopes that once they get up north, their friendship will go back to normal. Tension comes to a head the day both families go rafting on the Wolf River and the girls' tube tears on the rocks. Before they know it, Jocelyn and Alex are separated from their families.
Alex is convinced they should follow the footpath along the river to the meeting place at the end. Even though Jocelyn thinks they should stay put, she follows. Suddenly, they are very, very lost.
Wearing swimsuits and water shoes with only the contents of their soaked backpacks, the girls face threats from biting flies to black bears, poison ivy to hypothermia. Both Jocelyn and Alexis call upon resourcefulness they didn't know they had in their desperate return to safety. But beyond battling the elements, the girls will have to overcome their fractured friendship if they want to make it out of the woods alive.Author’s note.
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Gr 5-7-It's the first day of the annual family trip that Jocelyn ("Joss") and Alex's families take every summer to the Northwoods of Wisconsin, but this vacation looks nothing like the fun-filled trip that Joss anticipated. Alex has just ended their friendship, and now wants nothing to do with her, preferring to spend all her time texting her new best friend Laura Longbottom, the coolest girl at Walden Middle School. Ever since Alex befriended Laura at Spanish camp, she's been a part of the popular crowd. Her interests have changed, and it seems like Joss has been left behind. Joss doesn't want to go shopping or play with makeup. She just wants to keep the same traditions she's always had with her best friend. When Joss and Alex are forced to go inner-tubing on the river together, the last thing they expect is to get lost in the middle of the woods. The story is told chronologically through Joss and Alex's struggle to survive, and in flashbacks to key turning points in their friendship. Readers will empathize with both girls and ultimately root for their reconciliation. If Behrens's detailed and loving descriptions of the Northwoods of Wisconsin aren't enough, the "Note on the Setting" will convince readers to take a visit-while practicing safe tubing, of course. VERDICT A compelling and relatable middle school friendship tale for fans of survival stories.-Jessica Ko, Los Angeles Public Library?(c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.