I heard Kate Messner on a podcast talking about this book, and was very intrigued. The format is interesting. It's epistolary, but in a variety of formats (including hand-drawn graphic novels). The story is very engaging, as well. A prison breakout and subsequent manhunt as experienced by a group of kids in the local area. Each has a different connection to the prison and the escape. I think young readers will stop and think while reading this. It also might encourage some aspiring writers to try their hands at poetry.

This is a very fun book to read with interesting, well thought out characters. I liked this one a lot and I think the kids will too!

This book was absolutely fantastic. I've already added it to our library collection and will recommend it to students.

Breakout by Kate Messner is a story told from the perspective of three young girls, Lizzie, Nora, and Elidee, during a prison breakout in their small upstate New York town. Told completely through found documents, letters, drawings, and texts, they describe how their town is thrown into turmoil when two inmates escape from the prison where most of the town works. Messner deftly weaves a tale that delves into community, racism, profiling and more in a way that is easy for students to read but is thought provoking. This is a great middle grade novel that could spur on great classroom discussions.

This was perhaps my favorite middle-school read of 2018. The style is surely to appeal to young readers who will appreciate the intimacy that the letters, text messages, etc. offer, but the plot itself is what will keep them reading. As a teacher I appreciated the message. Just go and read this one. Then we'll talk.

There was so much to this book, but it works. I loved the style and content. It was engaging, though provoking and entertaining. Definitely recommend.

I don't really read middle grade novels, but that might change after finishing Breakout! I absolutely loved how Kate Messner handled such tough topics such as racism and white privilege and made it accessible and understandable for middle graders who might be confronting these subjects for the first time. The story unfolds uniquely through letters, "voice recordings," news stories, poems, and drawings collected for a time capsule project. I really enjoyed this format and appreciated all of the different literary and pop culture references (especially the Hamilton ones). This is a must read for any middle schooler!

Kate Messner just keeps getting better! This collection of letters, emails, texts, and journals tell a story not just of a prison breakout, but racism in a small town. It's about getting to know your community, and looking past the obvious to what may lie underneath. Compelling.

Messner's format used in Breakout really appealed to me, as it will my students. She tells the story in texts, letter, and comics. The coming-of-age content addressed by the novel is something all students should read.

Real events conjure intriguing fiction. Escapees, small town, students, families, danger, lockdowns, cancellations, traditions lost. Have the characters realized how idyllic their days really were? Will the reader stop to think about how lucky they are? My students love this story.

How well do you know the people in the place you call Home? When two inmates break out of the nearby maximum security prison, the whole town of Wolf Creek is on edge. For the students, there are minor annoyances that turn out to be more than they first believed. Told through texts, memos, comics and first person interviews for a school time capsule project, a fascinating and engaging read.

This book is quite an accomplishment. I can't imagine how much effort it took to incorporate the clever parodies of the raps and poems, while making them so applicable to the story. In the way that the characters became weary of the ongoing hunt for the escapees, some readers might feel the same as well. At first Lucy's father, the warden, reminded me of a recent story on "60 Minutes" where an official talked about what is best for prisoners in the long run; it is not always complete harshness. The way that and a few other related aspects of the story evolved were a bit disappointing.

Told through letters, texts, and journal entries, Breakout is the story of a VERY interesting summer project. With the community planning a time capsule, each student is given the chance to include items for extra credit and they have all summer to work on it. Well! That summer, a pair of inmates escape a maximum security prison and a manhunt unfolds.

I initially went into Breakout expecting a Middle Grade read I would breeze through. I’m thrilled to say this book was SO much more and took me by surprise. Breakout is instead an extremely thought-provoking novel about racism. While this wasn’t the lighthearted romp I anticipated, I’m so glad I took a chance with this one.

I like epistolary novels - the variety of voices, the sense of a story coming together. Breakout is an excellent example of this form. Messner addresses difficult themes like institutional racism within the framework of the compelling story of the search for two escaped inmates and how it impacts people in a prison town. Nora's awakening to the complexities of good people who still make wrong decisions is realistic and shows empathy for all "sides" of stories we read in the news. Highly recommended for middle grade readers.

It's two weeks before the end of school and the kids in Wolf Creek Middle School in upstate New York are looking forward to summer vacation. This year, however, they have a summer assignment to submit at least 5 items to be put into the Wolf Creek Community Time Capsule to be opened in fifty years. For best friends and lifetime residents of Wolf Creek Nora Tucker and Lizzie Bruno, the assignment is pretty interesting. Nora's father is the superintendent town's maximum security prison, and Lizzie's grandmother works in the prison kitchen.

But for Elidee Jones it's a very different story - she and her mother have just moved to Wolf Creek from New York City, a decision made when Elidee didn't get into the elite charter school she had applied to and since her brother is incarcerated in the prison, the move would make visiting him a lot easier. Nora and Lizzie are curious about Elidee, but find her to be unfriendly at first. Nora is also upset because she used to be the fastest runner in gym class, and Elidee beat her timing by 30 seconds running a mile.

But no sooner does Elidee begin school in Wolf Creek then two inmates escape from the prison and everything comes to a halt. People are told to lay low at home while an intense manhunt begins. Lizzie's grandmother is in the hospital so she's staying at Nora's and the two girls can't wait to get out of the house to find out what's happening. At home, Elidee writes letters to her brother Troy and begins to explore her own creative voice through poetry, influenced by Lin-Manuel Miranda's Hamilton, a play she saw with her NYC class just before moving.

As the days go by and the inmates aren't caught, the kids return to school and slowly Nora, Lizzie and Elidee form a tentative friendship. But the manhunt, the presence of reporters in town, the stress of thinking the two escapees might be everywhere and anywhere in or around Wolf Creek begins to crack open the friendly façade of the town's residents. Soon, Elidee is noticing racially based comments, behaviors, and microaggressions at school and in town, and experiments with recording her anger in different poetic forms. But Nora is also becoming aware that her beloved Wolf Creek isn't the warm, welcoming place she always thought it was, as she notices how people, including her mother, have an unconscious racism that makes them see Elidee not as a middle school kid, but as a racial stereotype. Thanks to her older brother, however, Nora also begins to understand some of the ways that systemic racism plays out in communities and especially disproportionate number of incarcerations of African Americans, as well as other social injustices faced by people of color in this country.

And Lizzie, well, she learns what it means to have a family member incarcerated when it comes out that the escape was an inside job.

Told through variety of methods - letters, text messages, poetry, recorded conversations, new reports, even comics, and by various people beside Nora, Lizzie and Elidee - Breakout is based on a real prison escape (and being a New Yorker, one that I remember quite well). Elidee's presence and the breakout aren't the main storyline, but really the catalyst that brings out people's true feelings about race and racial profiling. Once they see this happening, it is up to Nora and Lizzie to figure who their own authentic selves are and not Elidee's job to teach them or change them. Elidee's presence in the story is to find her own authentic voice as a poet for expressing her feelings about what she experiences.

Breakout is a fast read, but we get to know the main characters so well. I loved watching Elidee's growth as a poet, Nora growth as an empathic person (who knows what she will do with that) and Lizzie's growth as a journalist. But I really enjoyed seeing Elidee's growth as a poet. I think a lot of people don't realize that copying the style of greats artists is one way to get there. And Elidee has chosen some of the best - Langston Hughes, e.e. cummings, Jacqueline Woodson, Nikki Grimes, and of course Lin Manuel-Miranda. Interestingly, we never really discover why Elidee's brother is in prison and we don't need to know.

Breakout is a timely book and one that should be on every middle grade classroom, and every middle grade library.

This book is recommended for readers age 10+
This book was an EARC received from NetGalley

I was so excited to get my hands on this book after hearing all the buzz about the title. I think for its target demographic, it is just incredibly slow moving. I like the concept of the book--told in letters, etc. for the school's time capsule, but based on the pacing this would be a really hard sell to a middle grade reader as a librarian.

The story is told through various types of correspondence. Messner did an enormous amount of work on this book, analyzing Woodson’s poetry and Lin Manuel’s lyrics so that Elidee can use them as a framework to express herself. The author’s approach to showing white middle-grade readers how their classmates encounter racism is effective and poignant. It was an incredible risk, but one that was worth taking.

Timely topics for middle grade audience. "Breakout" covers many thought-provoking topics which are not always accessible for middle grade readers due to age-level appropriateness.

Things to love:
*Epistolary format: letters, diagrams, news reports, recordings, post-its, etc.
*Multiple POVs: family member of inmate, family member of accused aide to inmate, family member of inmate official AS WELL AS viewpoints of differing race
*Short "chapters" (due to epistolary format) mean there are lots of stopping points and feels like it reads faster

My only wish for this novel is that it moved a little faster. The story seemed very "bogged down" until around the 75% point.

This is the first Kate Messner book I have read but it won't be my last. I will purchase this one for my 5th grade language arts classroom.

Thank you, Netgalley and Bloomsbury USA, for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

WOW! This book is a 2018 standout and a must read for everyone! The way Messner set this book up was ground breaking and the best way to write this story. A prison break out in a small town is recorded from multiple perspectives through letters, texts, notes, articles and transcriptions. Very interesting.
The way Messner is able to talk about the big issues such as white privilege and inequity was profound. This book has power and should be read to all children 4th grade and above and discussed throughout.

Breakout was an amazing novel. Told through the lens of a black student in a mostly white town, this book does a great job exploring what students might feel like when they are fairly alone and targeted based on their race.

The town where they live is home to a prison, and when there is a breakout everyone in the town reacts in different ways. Has the prejudice always existed here, or is it a result of the circumstances? Does it matter?

The way the book mixes in poetry, Hamilton, and other things made this book a memorable read. You should definitely check it out.