It only looks easy

title: It only looks easy
Author: Pamela Curtis Swallow
Publisher: Scholastic
Place and year of publication: New York, 2003
Number of pages: 167 pages
Where I found the book: Christian Heritage School’s library

Story review:
The title of this book shows that life can’t always be easy and it might not look complicated as it is. Kat Randall lives with her beloved dog, Cheddar, her sister Hannah, and her parents. Kat is going into 7th grade and she’s feeling that this is going to be her best year. Kat comes before the school day and she finds out that Cheddar gets into a car accident. Cheddar goes to the veteran hospital before Kat’s first day of school that she’s been very excited for. She tries not to worry for her school day, but she gets impatient and “borrows” a bike to go to the veteran hospital. When she’s done, she finds out that the bike got stolen. Kat tells her parents about it and they tell her, to tell the bike owner (which is Melody Whiezersky), what had exactly happened to the bike.

Mrs. Lawrence is the one who gets Cheddar into a car accident and Mr. Lawrence invites Kat to go fishing together. While they’re fishing, Mr. Lawrence tells about his wife, about the Alzheimer’s disease that she has which makes you so confused that you can’t be left alone in the house and can’t remember things very well.

When Kat gets home, she finds out that Cheddar gets to come home soon. She gets excited but she remembers that she still got the bike problem. Kat’s school year is not going great as she expected and she tries to solve the problem as fast as she can, but doesn’t go smooth as she expects. Kat calls her two best friends; Abby and Matthew to see if they want help Kat to look for the bike. They look all over the place, but still can’t find it.

When she gets back, she gets a call from Mr. Lawrence and he asks if he can take care of Mrs. Lawrence. Kat says she will, because she still needs to earn more money for the bike. Kat helps Mrs. Lawrence with the gardening and when they are done, Kat gets some drinks and when she goes outside, she can’t find Mrs. Lawrence. Kat looks everywhere in the garden and the other side of the house and she’s not there, so Kat calls 911 and tell them what had happened. After she hangs up, she finds Mrs. Lawrence, coming out of the Bathroom. A moment later, a police car screeches at Mrs. Lawrence’s house and Kat tells that they lost a track of each other for a little bit.

About a half an hour later, Mr. Lawrence arrives and when Kat is about to leave, she sees a police officer, stretching something in the water and it was a bike. Kat tells the officer about the missing bike. He kept reaching the bikes out of the river and the fourth bike that he found was Melody’s bike. Even though the bike was missing some pieces; at least she found the bike. When Kat goes to the school the next day, she gets called in the principle office and she finds out that, her classmate, Dennis Boyle and his brother was the bike crime. They found the missing pieces in their shed. Dennis and his brother apologize to Kat and she is so happy that the bike crime is over. Kat realizes that everything is over now, and everything is now back to normal again.

Christian perspective:
This book doesn’t specifically talk about Christianity, but there are some actions and believes that Christians also believe and act in. The family kept praying when their dog got into a car accident. They also prayed when the bike got stolen. The main characters shows some Christianity perspective, when her classmate asked for help, she helped her classmate even though she didn’t wanted to and had lots of other things that she had to deal with.

My thoughts:
In my perspective, I think this is a great book, especially to those who like dogs. I enjoyed the book, because this book taught me some lessons about being patient and looking at the positive perspective. I like how this book makes you curious and makes you wonder about the next chapter. I like how this book isn’t just focused on one main idea, but focused on school, friendships, family, and lots of other things that are happening around you. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes to talk about their friendships, communities, school and who likes animals.