Details

Length: 433
Story Build: Quick 
Character development: Solid
Age Recommendation: 5th and up  
Reasoning: main characters are in middle school 

Summary and Review

I remember seeing this book over the summer and wanting to read it. Then one of my students did a book project on it for Trimester 2, and it brought back the title into my memory. So, I purchased a copy for my classroom and brought it home to read during the quarantine of 2020. 

I started off reading it at night, but this is one of those books that you need to just read GIANT pieces of in a sitting. During one particular rainy day, I sat down on the couch and immersed myself in Messner’s world. 

It was easy to do. 

This book is not written in the traditional narrative format. Instead, the book is told through letters, transcribed interviews, text messages, news clippings etc… Therefore, you can BREEZE through this text at a fast clip. 

However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t deep layers to this text. 

Breakout has multiple narrators but mainly focuses on Nora and Elidee. Nora has lived in Wolf Creek her whole life and her father is the head of the prison that is located in the small town. She is an aspiring journalist whose best friend, Lizzie, tags along mostly to write parody pieces for Nora. They have a summer assignment to write letters to the future citizens of their town for a time capsule, so they begin to document furiously when two inmates escape from the prison. 

Elidee is new to town, having moved from New York City . She and her mother have moved to be closer to her brother, Troy, who is in the state prison. While Wolf Creek claims to be welcoming, Elidee finds that she is on the outside. She finds comfort in poetry and learning from Nikki Grimes and the raps in Hamilton. 

Throughout the novel, the girls find themselves dancing around a friendship based on a joint love of running. Elidee must let her guard down while Nora must become more open-minded.

But Messner also serves up some suspense — will the dangerous inmates be found? Who helped them escape? Will they hurt any townspeople?

She also tests the water with deeper themes of racial tensions. Elidee and her mother are black and definitely receive different treatment, which is acknowledged by Nora. Her view of the world grows, and there are conversations in the book centered around race and white privilege. 

Breakout was more than I expected, and I like that. It was about breaking out of a prison, breaking out of your comfort zone, and breaking out of expectations. 

Celebrations

I really liked the various topics and layers to the novel that Messner brought. She was able to talk about a prison break, an end of school celebration, racial tension, and friend drama all in one book. It was woven together really well. 

Hesitations

It took me a bit to get into the format of the writing with the different types of texts presented. But once I did, I LOVED the diversity of its presentation.