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[Following is a volunteer review of "Island Games" by Caleb J. Boyer.]

Island Games by Caleb J. Boyer is an adventure thriller, which is written from a third person perspective. The book is of short length having only 232 pages in it. The starting scene begins with Ryan and Mathew, the two teenage boys, lying on a beach of an unknown island and baffling between their conscious and unconscious state for a long time. After regaining their full consciousness, they don’t have any clue about where they are, and how they came there. After some time they begin to worry about getting the basic amenities like food, water, and shelter in order to survive on that island. In the meanwhile, they are exposed to the unknown dangers of that place. Will these boys survive all the dangers until the end?

As the boys begin their search for the basic amenities as well as the means to escape from this mysterious island, they discover that what they see with eyes is only a tip of the iceberg. They pass through a series of confrontations with the fatal dangers that come along their way, which challenges them to test their strength, courage, intelligence, and depth of their friendship.

The character development was quite impressive as the author had maintained a nice balance between the contrasting characters like one boy with a goofy mindset and another boy with a practical mindset. Ryan and Mathew were always supportive of each other; however, at times they were sarcastic toward one another with a long bantering back and forth between them that made me laugh. All this made me recall my teenage days.

Even though the book is targeted at young adults, I believe that teenagers will love this book very much because it resonates powerfully with them. I recommend this book to the teenage and above age group people who want to entertain themselves with an action-packed, thrilling story that could bring them to the edge of their seats. However, the book does not have the very intense action scenes so that only the people with a strong heart can read it, and anyone can have a shallow dip in it.

The thing I liked the most is that this book depicts the importance of teamwork and how it pays off. Moreover, it was quite fun and rewarding to read. The story sometimes appeared to me like a wishful dream in the Gulliver’s travels stories, and it gave some relaxation to my mind. I was amazed to know that this book was written by a twelve-year-old boy. I picked up this book because I expected that it may entertain me, and I realized that it met my expectations after reading the book. Nothing ever in this book bored me.

I do not recommend this book for those who need the story-line close to reality because this book has some elements that do not seem to be practical in real life. Sometimes while reading, I had a feeling of playing an action-packed video game. The only thing I disliked about this book is its short length, and also details given in describing the scenes were bit insufficient, and thereby, leaving it to the readers to imagine themselves.

This book deserves a full rating of four stars if it goes through another round of professional editing, but I found several grammatical errors in this book. One of the errors is in the sentence “They had needed to pull together …..”, which should have been “They needed to pull together …..” to look more appropriate. Another error is in the sentence “He was hopeful the beasts would not return …..”, which should have been “He was hopeful that the beasts would not return …..” to make it look correct. However, these errors do not distort the meaning of the sentences. Moreover, the lucid writing made the pages to turn very fast, and I could complete it reading within two days. I could give only 3 out of 4 stars because of the grammatical errors and my dislikes mentioned earlier.

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Island Games
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I do like adventure thrillers, but I also like good descriptions as well. It sounds as it the author has a good future ahead of him if he continues to write. Thanks for a great review!






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I read this book also. Before reading your review, I had not considered the fact that parts of the story do seem to imitate playing a video game. Excellent point. Your review was very engaging and enjoyable.

Bluebird03 wrote: ↑23 May 2019, 09:34 I read this book also. Before reading your review, I had not considered the fact that parts of the story do seem to imitate playing a video game. Excellent point. Your review was very engaging and enjoyable.

Thanks for your valuable reply.

I loved the banter between the boys, too. That was my favorite part of the book. I liked the book overall, but I found it to be too repetitive. It seemed like the same thing kept happening over and over again to me. I wish the challenges they faced had been more unpredictable.

The storyline interested me in this book and knowing it's written by a twelve year old boy makes me want to read it even more. Your amazement in finding that out must mean it's too advanced to be written for his age. If not you'd have found it to be childish. So, I'll definitely read this book and thanks for the great review.

I read this book as well. I was amazed that it was written by a 12 year old. I think my nephew would love it, though there are some deficiencies. Thanks for the great review!

Kaylee123 wrote: ↑24 May 2019, 09:12 I loved the banter between the boys, too. That was my favorite part of the book. I liked the book overall, but I found it to be too repetitive. It seemed like the same thing kept happening over and over again to me. I wish the challenges they faced had been more unpredictable.

I agree with you, thanks for stopping by and reply.

Hiruni Bhagya 81 wrote: ↑24 May 2019, 15:50 The storyline interested me in this book and knowing it's written by a twelve year old boy makes me want to read it even more. Your amazement in finding that out must mean it's too advanced to be written for his age. If not you'd have found it to be childish. So, I'll definitely read this book and thanks for the great review.

Yes twelve year boy writing this review is wonderful, Thanks for stopping by and reply.

Like you said, I do think that the author would benefit from an editor's hand, to eliminate the errors and to flesh out certain parts of the book. Still, it seems like a book with potential. Thanks for the review!

gen_g wrote: ↑25 May 2019, 10:44 Like you said, I do think that the author would benefit from an editor's hand, to eliminate the errors and to flesh out certain parts of the book. Still, it seems like a book with potential. Thanks for the review!

Thanks for stopping by and valuable reply.

I love reading survival style novels. Amazing that the author was so young, yet able to write such a well written novel. It's a shame about the errors, but they look easily fixed. Thanks for the review!

danielleamy wrote: ↑27 May 2019, 14:23 I love reading survival style novels. Amazing that the author was so young, yet able to write such a well written novel. It's a shame about the errors, but they look easily fixed. Thanks for the review!

I feel author might have fixed those errors by now, yet it was great accomplishment at young age by author. thanks for stopping by and reply.