The Face on the Milk Carton
- 192
- Pages
- about 3.5 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“The Face on the Milk Carton” builds a young adult mystery on the gripping premise of a girl who sees her own face on a missing-child notice. Janie Johnson, fifteen, hunts for the truth while hiding her suspicion from her parents. Some readers find the pace slow and the characters thin. Others are moved by its sympathy for everyone involved, the girl and the parents on both sides.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
The Face on the Milk Carton is a young adult mystery novel written by author Caroline B. Cooney that was first published in 1990. The first in the five-book Janie Johnson series, it was later adapted into a film for television. The book is about a 15-year-old girl named Janie Johnson, who starts to suspect that her parents may have kidnapped her and that her biological parents are somewhere in New Jersey. These suspicions come after Janie recognizes a picture of herself on a milk carton under the heading "Missing Child." Janie's life gets more stressful as she tries to find the truth while hiding the secret from her parents.
Reading order · Janie Johnson
Full order & progress →- The Face on the Milk CartonThis book
7.57.5 / 10 - Whatever Happened to JanieWhatever Happened to Janie–Not ranked yet
- The Voice on the RadioThe Voice on the Radio–Not ranked yet
- What Janie FoundWhat Janie Found–Not ranked yet
- Janie Face to FaceJanie Face to Face–Not ranked yet
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.1 across 105 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 42% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Young adult average of 7.8. That is how 7.5 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.5 | 16 | 15% |
| Hardcover | 6.9 | 89 | 85% |
Frequently asked
What age is The Face on the Milk Carton for?
The Face on the Milk Carton sits on the Young adult shelf in the sources we use, which by convention means roughly ages 13 and up. This is a guide from the book’s category, not a publisher’s age rating. It has 192 pages — shorter than 98% of the ranked books in Young adult.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Young adult — with scores between 7.5 and 7.6, closest to this book.
