The Raft- S.A. Bodeen

Title: The Raft
Author: S.A. Bodeen
Source: Borrowed from the library
Series: No
Rating: 4/5















Robie is an experienced traveler. She’s taken the flight from Honolulu to the Midway Atoll, a group of Pacific islands where her parents live, many times. When she has to get to Midway in a hurry after a visit with her aunt in Hawaii, she gets on the next cargo flight at the last minute. She knows the pilot, but on this flight, there’s a new co-pilot named Max. All systems are go until a storm hits during the flight. The only passenger, Robie doesn’t panic until the engine suddenly cuts out and Max shouts at her to put on a life jacket. They are over miles of Pacific Ocean. She sees Max struggle with a raft. 

And then . . . she’s in the water. Fighting for her life. Max pulls her onto the raft, and that’s when the real terror begins. They have no water. Their only food is a bag of Skittles. There are sharks. There is an island. But there’s no sign of help on the way.

This book may only be 231 pages but so much goes down in such a short amount of time. Robbie decides to take a small plane back to Midway Atoll which she has done numerous times before. The only difference is this time she will not make it back to her parent's house. The plane is caught in a storm and crashes into the ocean where Robbie is left with only a raft and Max. She must learn to survive in the middle of the ocean with only a raft.

Max is an interesting character, he sort of just hangs out in the background and occasionally appears in the story but he has such a significant role in the story. I think if Max was to be portrayed in any other way something in the story would be missing. Robbie was not my favourite protagonist to read about. She was a little whiny in the beginning and I found her frustrating. She seemed like she wanted to give up and needed to be coaxed constantly to try. Her natural instinct would take over and she would be forced to survive but she seemed to upset about the fact that she was being forced to try.

I found the premise of the story to be very much like Cast Away which I thought was pretty awesome. I really enjoyed the premise and I loved how it was set up. I loved the setting chosen and the research the author put into it to identify the wildlife that would be in the area. Overall it was really well written and it felt like a lot of research was put into this book.

The ending was a little predictable to me but never the less I really enjoyed this book and I would recommend it. This is a book that is underrated. I really hope that it gets more notice. I look forward to Bodeen's other books and I hope I will enjoy them just as much as I enjoyed this one.