Outside Nowhere

Parker Kelbrook is slick, which allows him to slide out of whatever trouble he gets into. It works fine until his benefactor, Ms. Birdseye, gets him a summer job. But Parker’s best friend is going to spend a month at the beach, and Parker wants to go, so he plays a dirty trick to get fired so he can go to the beach. Not so fast, says his father. Ms. Birdseye has another assignment for Parker. He is put on a train and sent to a farm in the middle of nowhere. The work is hard. The only thing grown is radishes, and they are sold two or three at a time. But there is more going on than meets the eye, and it is a mystery Parker wants to solve.

Adam Borba has written a unique story that is fun, engaging, and full of magic and mystery. The characters are all well-rounded and complex, each with their own backstory. The setting perfectly matches this unusual story, with it being contemporary and at the same time awfully old-fashioned. Young readers (and older ones as well) will be engaged to the end trying to figure out what the heck is going on.