This is Not a Drill
Author: Beck McDowell
Purchase on Amazon
and Barnes
and Noble.
Synopsis: Emery:
Teaching French to eighteen first-graders? Very cool. Getting partnered with
Jake? Now that was just cruel. After what he did, I didn’t even want to speak
to him.
Jake: Yeah, I messed things up with Emery, I admit it. But I
actually thought this tutoring gig might give me a chance to show her I wasn’t
a total jerk.
Emery: And then it happened. So fast. A solider charged into the
room and demanded his son. We couldn’t have known that he’d pull a gun when he
was told no. Now we were trapped with him—just me and Jake, with all those kids
looking to us to protect them.
Jake: What I saw in the guy’s eyes scared me, but what could I
do? One wrong move could send him over the edge. I had to save Emery and the
kids. The last thing I wanted was to let her down again. I had to find a way to
stop him . . .
Brought to you by TeamNerd Reviewer
Annabell Cadiz
Review: In the wake of the Newtown tragedy, a book like This is Not a Drill is not only
immensely palpable, but emotionally heartbreaking.
Emery and Jake
are two seventeen-year-olds, who not only use to date and had a nasty falling
out, but have also been partnered up to teach a class of eighteen first-graders
as part of their grade for their French class. On a usual morning of reading to
the kids, a man suddenly storms into the classroom, demanding his son, Patrick.
Brian Strutts is an ex-soldier suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
(PTSD) and has fallen on hard times. His wife has chosen to divorce him, but he’ll
be damned if she takes away his son. Since the front office won’t let him leave
with Patrick, Brain sees no other option than to take the entire class hostage.
This book hits
at every parent’s worst nightmare and reminds the world of the horrors many
parents have already had to endure in the history of our country. This is Not a Drill is targeted toward
Young Adults, but parents will benefit from reading it as well.
The best part to
this book are the children—the eighteen first-graders. They are so beautifully
innocent and amazingly resilient and brave for being so young. They’re scared
but determined to believe everything is going to be okay, especially because
they truly and fully trust their first grade teacher, Mrs. Campbell, as well as
Emery and Jake. Kids are so trusting and filled with so much hope and reading
through how they react throughout the book just brought tears to my eyes. There
is this one memorable scene where a little boy named Simon confesses it’s his
birthday and that his mother gave him cupcakes to pass to the class. I just
wanted to scoop him up and hug him! He even shares the cupcake with the man
holding them hostage. I lost it after that. Just a reminder to how loving and
forgiving kids are.
There isn’t much
of a plot to the book. It’s mainly focused on the students and Brian Strutts
inside the classroom. The kids keep the plot alive and Mrs. Campbell. The
moments of Brian’s outbursts or when the security guard and police get involved
add tension and minor action to the plot. But the story still manages to keep
the reader’s attention and pulls at your heartstrings throughout.
Mrs. Campbell is
the type of teacher every parent would want for his or her child. She is kind,
sweet, yet firm and patient. She keeps her cool in the face of such crippling
fear and keeps the kids feeling safe even with a gunman inside their classroom.
Brian Sturtts story
is, sadly, an all too common tale of what soldiers endure when they return home
from service: emotional and mental breakdown as they work toward readjusting to
civilian life and the lack of adequate care for veterans. The heartache and
pain he had to live with and the struggles he faced are very much real.
I did have some
issues with the story though. Emery and Jake’s romantic relationship seemed to
be unnecessary to the plot. The flashbacks as to what happened to break them up
and how they still feel about each other, and Jake trying to convince Emery he’s
changed in the middle of a dangerous situation, felt out of place. I did like
how they teamed up to work together to protect the kids and the way they
interacted and reassured the children.
There’s a scene
where Jake searches for info on how to identify a hamster’s sex and hamster sex
in general (because of something one of the kids said) and that seemed
ridiculously unnecessary. And how he ends up getting online without Strutts
noticing wasn’t all too believable. HOW Jake winds up finding a way to reach
the outside world I could believe, but Strutts never picking up on it or
noticing, I didn’t believe.
The ending was
predictable and came off feeling very rushed and convenient. I would have liked
a longer book to really grasp the tension and fear in a situation as horrifying
as the ones the characters face, and for the ending to be done more smoothly.
I would still
recommend to both parents and young adults to pick up a copy of This is Not a Drill. Whether you read it
separately or together, this is a book that will touch your heart and leave you
grateful for the people in your life. You will want to wrap your children in
your arms and demand better care for our soldiers who give so much to ensure
our freedom.
About the Author: Beck McDowell is a YA author with emphasis on the
Adult in Young Adult. She loves intelligent books with strong plots and
quirky characters written in simple, creative language. THIS IS NOT A DRILL is her debut into
the Young Adult Fiction Genre. She also wrote the non-fiction book LAST BUS OUT,
the story of Courtney Miles, who stole a bus after Hurricane Katrina,
and drove over 300 people to safety. Beck lives in Huntsville,
Alabama with her lawyer husband, David; her two adult children, Emily and Drew,
also live there. She's not a fan of routine so she writes anywhere from two
hours a day to fourteen hours, sometimes in pajamas (but occasionally in
pearls,) usually in the morning, but now and then all night. Beck loves being
allowed to "pay it forward" in honor of favorite writers who hooked
her on reading at a young age. She values the process of writing above any
product; time spent learning to do something well is never wasted.
Where to Find the Author
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