Hatchet is a book about a boy, a lake, and a hand tool, and it has kept millions of readers turning pages since 1987. Ask them why and they rarely mention plot. They mention the sentences.
Gary Paulsen wrote in short, plain declaratives that carry real weight because the stakes are real: hunger, cold, fire, fear. Nothing is decorative. Every paragraph is a problem to be solved, and the reader solves it alongside Brian.
That is the whole trick, and it is not a trick at all. Respect the reader’s intelligence, give them something true to worry about, and get out of the way. A book built that way does not go out of date.