Bodett's strength is his humor. This is written as a drama, lacking that wonderful slyness in all his previous books. I know he can manage it along with drama, as he did in Norman Tuttle. So I'm wondering why the miss.

I might be more forgiving if it were another, less talented author.
The story itself was interesting enough and the climax scene had me breathless with anxiety. ( )

By the guy who does the Super 8 Motel commercials. Ivan and September are trusted by their father to stay home alone in their bayside home while he’s on a fishing trip in Dutch Harbor. They’ve been instructed not to sail to town and the specter of being sent to stay at their dreaded Aunt Nelda’s hangs over them. But when Ivan shorts the communication radios while playing his video games, he and September embark on a deepening trap of deception as they try to get the radios fixed before their father makes his weekly call. The culmination of all this is the severe storm they get caught in trying to sail home from town when they realize their father has returned from his trip. Interesting look at secluded life in Alaska.

Fiction: Chapter Book
Bodett, Tom Williwaw! Knoff, 1999. 192p. Middle-school
Ivan and September, ages 12 and 13, are left at home in Steamer Cove, a remote place in coastal Alaska, while their father is on a fishing trip. They disobey their father’s orders and end up getting themselves in all sorts of problems culminating in getting caught out in their skiff in a williwaw (a sudden violent wind). This quick-paced tale is an emotional journey. Told in the third person point of view; the themes are self-sufficiency, courage, and family.
AK: Black bear, fishing, clamming, coastal Alaska life
Activity: Have they ever been out in rough seas? What was it like? What happened? ( )

Bodett has really caught the brother/sister relationship here, great characterization. Several times he gives us entry into September's thoughts and then segues into her younger brother Ivan's thoughts--which are so different in mood. These kids, ages 12 & 13, have a strong sense of values (being truthful, responsible, hard-working)but reached a time when they chose to act against that. This book is the story of the escalating consequences.
I couldn't understand why September never went into the electronics repair shop with her brother, nor why the harbor master, who had years of experience, didn't try to keep them at the safe berth when he saw the storm coming. I'm glad that the reasoning behind the maxim "Red Sky at night, sailor's ..." was finally explained. ( )

Comparable to a Will Hobbs novel.