Book Review: On the Island by Tracey Garvis-Graves

Title: On the Island
Author: Tracey Garvis-Graves
Genre: Chick Lit, Adult, Contemporary Romance
Release Date: October 11th, 2011

Rating:

Book Blurb from Goodreads:

When thirty-year-old English teacher Anna Emerson is offered a job tutoring T.J. Callahan at his family's summer rental in the Maldives, she accepts without hesitation; a working vacation on a tropical island trumps the library any day. T.J. Callahan has no desire to leave town, not that anyone asked him. He's almost seventeen and if having cancer wasn't bad enough, now he has to spend his first summer in remission with his family - and a stack of overdue assignments - instead of his friends.
Anna and T.J. are en route to join T.J.'s family in the Maldives when the pilot of their seaplane suffers a fatal heart attack and crash-lands in the Indian Ocean. Adrift in shark-infested waters, their life jackets keep them afloat until they make it to the shore of an uninhabited island.
Now Anna and T.J. just want to survive and they must work together to obtain water, food, fire, and shelter. Their basic needs might be met but as the days turn to weeks, and then months, the castaways encounter plenty of other obstacles, including violent tropical storms, the many dangers lurking in the sea, and the possibility that T.J.'s cancer could return. As T.J. celebrates yet another birthday on the island, Anna begins to wonder if the biggest challenge of all might be living with a boy who is gradually becoming a man.

Oh boy. I was having doubts with this one when I decided to read it. It was because my reader played with me, I thought that I'm gonna read a 600 page book. But really it's just 300 something. I just read this in one day! Yay! I would finish it sooner if I didn't do anything other than read, but well, anyway...

I was speechless. I enjoyed reading it, I smiled, laughed and got teary-eyed. When I started it, I wished that I would like it. And yes, I got my wish, I loved it. From the start, the story had me. I got hooked, I almost didn't want to eat cause I want to read what happened to them. The love story was, for me, predictable. We all know what the world view of having a huge age gap relationship - 13 years age difference - people would surely talk about it, especially in this book because Anna is a teacher. BUT, the rest of the story? NO, it's not predictable.

Survival is never predictable in an island. I would never dream of living in a deserted island with nothing at all but trees, ocean animals and the sea in front of you. Anna and TJ did everything to survive. I really thought that they were going to die and will never be home again.

I love that Anna and TJ's romance didn't start as soon as they were stranded on the island. It develops slowly, giving them enough time. Sure, TJ was attracted to Anna from the start but he didn't just jump to her once he had a chance.

I really can't explain very well why and how I love this book. I recommend it to all, I don't really mind the cursing in here and some sex since it's not really THAT descriptive unlike to some books I read. :P