Book Descriptions
for Blink & Caution by Tim Wynne-Jones
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
Runaway Blink has been living on the streets for months when he stumbles onto the staged kidnapping of a wealthy businessman at the swanky hotel where he was stealing breakfast and finds himself in possession of the “victim’s” cell phone. Runaway Caution has been living with a controlling drug dealer and is now attempting to escape. Tim Wynne-Jones adroitly moves back and forth between two compelling individual stories, blending them into a single and mesmerizing whole as the two teens eventually meet on a train. Caution is trying to get away from Toronto, while Blink is on the trail of the businessman, persuaded by the man’s teenage daughter—whom Blink called to provide assurance her father was okay—to find out if he’s at the remote retreat owned by his company. Blink and Caution form an alliance and find themselves on the trail of a crime that didn’t happen but that masks a real crime involving corporate greed. As they journey together, trust, friendship—and something more—begin to form, enabling them to not only reveal dimensions of their personal histories but also to begin a journey of healing. Told in two distinct narrative styles (an insightful and darkly funny second-person voice for Blink, and a third-person voice for Caution), this tense, suspense-filled novel starts out gritty but ends with two teens who believed they had nowhere to turn finding the courage to confront their pasts. In doing so, they gain a sense of hope for their futures. (Age 13 and older)
CCBC Choices 2012. © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 2012. Used with permission.
From the Publisher
Two street kids get tangled in a plot over their heads - and risk an unexpected connection - in this heart-pounding thriller by Tim Wynne-Jones.
Boy, did Blink get off on the wrong floor. All he wanted was to steal some breakfast for his empty belly, but instead he stumbled upon a fake kidnapping and a cell phone dropped by an "abducted" CEO, giving Blink a link to his perfect blonde daughter. Now Blink is on the run, but it’s OK as long as he’s smart enough to stay in the game and keep Captain Panic locked in his hold. Enter a girl named Caution. As in "Caution: Toxic." As in "Caution: Watch Your Step." She’s also on the run, from a skeezy drug-dealer boyfriend and from a nightmare in her past that won’t let her go. When she spies Blink at the train station, Caution can see he’s an easy mark. But there’s something about this naïve, skinny street punk, whom she only wanted to rob, that tugs at her heart, a heart she thought deserved not to feel. Charged with suspense and intrigue, this taut novel trails two deeply compelling characters as they forge a blackmail scheme that is foolhardy at best, disastrous at worst - along with a fated, tender partnership that will offer them each a rare chance for redemption.
Boy, did Blink get off on the wrong floor. All he wanted was to steal some breakfast for his empty belly, but instead he stumbled upon a fake kidnapping and a cell phone dropped by an "abducted" CEO, giving Blink a link to his perfect blonde daughter. Now Blink is on the run, but it’s OK as long as he’s smart enough to stay in the game and keep Captain Panic locked in his hold. Enter a girl named Caution. As in "Caution: Toxic." As in "Caution: Watch Your Step." She’s also on the run, from a skeezy drug-dealer boyfriend and from a nightmare in her past that won’t let her go. When she spies Blink at the train station, Caution can see he’s an easy mark. But there’s something about this naïve, skinny street punk, whom she only wanted to rob, that tugs at her heart, a heart she thought deserved not to feel. Charged with suspense and intrigue, this taut novel trails two deeply compelling characters as they forge a blackmail scheme that is foolhardy at best, disastrous at worst - along with a fated, tender partnership that will offer them each a rare chance for redemption.
Publisher description retrieved from Google Books.