Back Cover Book Blurb:

Sixteen-year-old Alley Price just wants her autistic classmate, Ben Sanders, to shut up because he won’t stop babbling about a blizzard that’s being predicted. But when the Great Blizzard of 1978 slams into Ohio, and Alley finds herself stranded in a garage with her would-be rapist, she turns to Ben for help in the middle of the night. The events that unfold change her attitude toward people with disabilities and reheat her relationship with Jesus.

My Thoughts:

As a Book Reviewer, I received a copy of A Break in the Weather. However, I was not required to write a positive review or any review. These are my honest opinions of the book.

A Break in the Weather is Roy Wood’s debut novel. It is YA. The story starts with tension between Alley Price and her mom’s boyfriend, and that tension and the situation continue to build until a snow blizzard. During the blizzard, the situation between Alley and her mom’s boyfriend escalates until Alley runs out in the blizzard, afraid for her safety.

Alley becomes a hero of the story through all the events that take place during the blizzard, but as she is stuck in a garage and not sure how to survive the blizzard, she reaches out to a boy she knows from school, who has Autism. She knows he’s very smart when it comes to science related things, so she calls him on the phone in the middle of the night, despite the fact that she ordinarily finds him quite annoying, and he quickly becomes a hero in the story as well.

Also, as Alley faces all of the events during the blizzard, she begins to think about Jesus. She hasn’t given him much time or attention in years, despite the fact that her best friend is a Christian, and Alley’s grandmother talked to her about Jesus a lot, until her grandmother passed away.

I found this story suspenseful and exciting, but the suspense and excitement slows down in the middle as the author focuses on events at school. However, just because the suspense and excitement slows down, this story, in no way, gets boring. Mr. Wood did a great job of developing his characters and expressing their very different personalities and how they react and respond to one another. Mr. Wood also did a great job in portraying how the characters learned to make good decisions, accept one another, work together, help one another, and encourage one another.

In the last third of the story, the tension and suspense build again, but not quite to the level they did in the first third, but readers who crave tension and suspense won’t be disappointed.

I really enjoyed this story and its characters. I also liked how Mr. Wood ended with an epilogue that gives the reader a glimpse into the Alley’s future as an adult.

Although this story includes a very awkward uncomfortable relationship that leads to revealing a character as a child predator and there is some violence, this is a clean story — no explicit sexual scenes and no profanity. Also, the child predator story line is brought to a satisfactory conclusion without being extremely traumatic or difficult to read.

There were just two places in the book, where I found a couple of scenes to be a bit confusing, but, they didn’t keep me from disliking the story or finishing the book.

I recommend A Break in the Weather by Roy Wood to readers ages 16 and up, who enjoy well-written, exciting YA stories that include a positive message or two.

I give A Break in the Weather by Roy Wood 5 stars.