On the Island

Thirty-year-old English teacher Anna Emerson jumps at the chance to instruct T.J. Callahan at his family's Maldivian summer rental; working vacations on tropical islands are always preferable than library trips.

Not that anybody pushed T.J. Callahan to leave town, but he has no desire to do so. As if being a seventeen-year-old with cancer wasn't difficult enough, he now has to spend his first summer in remission away from his friends and with his family, along with a mountain of unfinished projects.

When their seaplane pilot has a fatal heart attack and crashes in the Indian Ocean, Anna and T.J. are on their way to see T.J.'s relatives in the Maldives. Their life jackets keep them afloat as they drift through shark-infested seas until they reach the coast of an abandoned island. Now, all Anna and T.J. want is to live, and in order to do so, they have to cooperate in order to find food, water, shelter, and fire.

Their basic necessities may be provided for, but as the days stretch into weeks and eventually months, the castaways face a plethora of additional challenges, such as strong tropical storms, many perils in the water, and the potential for T.J.'s cancer to recur. Living with a youngster who is gradually growing into a man could be the toughest struggle of all, Anna thinks as T.J. celebrates yet another birthday on the island.