Running Out of Time

By Margaret Peterson Haddix

Book Overview

Run For Your Life
Jessie lives with her family in the frontier village of Clifton, Indiana, in 1840 -- or so she believes. When diphtheria strikes the village and the children of Clifton start dying, Jessie's mother reveals a shocking secret -- it's actually 1996, and they are living in a reconstructed village that serves as a tourist site. In the world outside, medicine exists that can cure the dread disease, and Jessie's mother is sending her on a dangerous mission to bring back help.
But beyond the walls of Clifton, Jessie discovers a world even more alien and threatening than she could have imagined, and soon she finds her own life in jeopardy. Can she get help before the children of Clifton, and Jessie herself, run out of time?

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0689812361
• ISBN13: 9780689812361
• Release Date: February 1997
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.51 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.1" x 7.6"
• Age Range: 9 to 12 years
• Grade Range: Grades 4 to 7

Customer Reviews

Nice and complex conspiracy theory.

Thirteen-year-old Jessie lives in a frontier town named Clifton, Indiana, in the year 1840. It is a nice, comfortable town. Her father is a blacksmith, which is indispensable, and her mother looked after sick people at night when the local Doc was asleep. One day, her mother discovered that the town was plagued with diphtheria. People were going to die without proper medicine. So due to circumstances, Jessie was sent out of town to get back help. This trip could prove deadly for Jessie as she is about to find her world turned upside-down, and we are also in for shock as we discover a cabal behind a deadly plot. They say that the people who write best are those people that write about what they know, and Margaret Peterson Haddix knew of a tourist place like where our story starts. Yet the strength in Haddix's story is not as much the intriguing plot as it is her description of people and things. She makes you wonder what you should do. I knew or thought I knew the story before reading the book, as I saw the movie "The Village" (2004). However, the movie was readjusted to match M. Night Shyamalan's standard formula, including the standard ending twist. The book was more complex and did not need a last-minute twist.

A Magnificent Novel

Jessie is a young girl who lives with her family in an 1840 village, Clifton, Indiana. She learns a shocking secret that sends her mind racing. Jessie, only thirteen-years-old, must save her village from the spreading disease diphtheria. As I read this book one mystery unfolded after another. Margaret Peterson Haddix kept me on my toes and begging for more. This book is stuffed full with adventure, mystery, hope, and destiny. I attempted to set Running out of Time down, but I longed to know Jessie's fate. This magnificent novel was very enjoyable to read. I couldn't wait to start the next chapter, and when the story ended I wished it hadn't. I had gotten so attached to the characters that I hoped that it would never end.

This is a wonderful book!

I first read this wonderful book years ago (for school), and I still own a copy. It is about the adventures of a young girl named Jessie, a citizen of an 1840 town called Clifton Village. Unbeknownst to her and the other children of the village, she is actually living in the modern day (at that time 1996) inside of a tourist site - sort of an ultra Colonial Williamsburg their parents volunteered to become a part of in the early 1980s. However, when Jessie's friends start dying of a terrible disease, her mother reveals the truth to her and sends her on a mission to escape the compound to bring back modern medicine. Banned from the site because it is "historically inaccurate," this medicine that works is the only thing that will save Jessie's friends. What the villagers don't know, however, is that there is an even more sinister reason the medicine is not allowed... read the book! This is a wonderful book that really makes you think...unfortunately, because I read this book, I caught onto the plot of a certain movie that came out the other day pretty quickly...