The Big Lie by Julie Mayhew reviewed by Rhian Ivory

 

 

The Big Lie by Julie Mayhew

Synopsis

“I am a good girl. It is my most defining feature. And that’s the truth.”

What if the Nazis had won WWII? What if one girl could win it back? If only for herself…

Buckinghamshire 2014. Jessika Keller is one of the Third Reich’s shining lights. She is an exemplary member of the Bund Deutscher Mädel, a future figure skating champion and the apple of her father’s eye. But when her neighbour and lifelong friend Clementine challenges the regime, Jessika begins to understand the frightening reality of the society in which she lives.

The Big Lie is an alt-history thriller which asks readers to examine their own attitudes to feminism, sexuality and revolution.

 

Review

One of the central themes in The Big Lie is of course the concept of lying and the lies we all tell, big and small, black or white. Mayhew repeatedly plays with the notion of lying by drawing characters who ‘leave out something that they didn’t realise was really very crucial to everyone else. That isn’t a lie. But it can be as bad as telling a lie.’

The protagonist Jessika Keller is a good girl who is driven by a desperate desire to please. Jess feels a huge responsibility to please her father and the patriarchy that dominates her world. When Jess’s feelings for her female friends start to change she knows this is something that must be kept from her father, she tries to reassure herself that this isn’t a lie, it is just leaving out something.

‘A very small victory. I knew something he didn’t.’

And these feelings are universal to all readers and ones we can identify with, that sensation of power, of knowledge and having secrets from your parents. Even though she has secrets Jess tries very hard to be outwardly normal, obeying the rules and making sure that those around her do the same, no matter what the cost to her friendship with Clementine.

‘Then Clementine said: ‘It’s hard for you…But at least I know what I am.’

Although Jess is living in what most readers would view as a nightmare scenario, to her it is normal life. Maintaining a sense of normality, being the very model of a perfect girl drives Jess on even when she knows that the biggest lie of all is the one she’s telling herself.

‘I had proved that I was normal, and special…I mustn’t let people get close to me. Only bad came of it.’

And there is no room in Jess’s life for questions about sexuality, feelings and desires because that’s not what she’s there for, her purpose and role have been clearly defined since birth. Jess knows how a good girl should think and speak and act because she’s been told so by the people in charge, the men who run The Bund Deutscher Mädel the organization set up to recruit teenage girls to adore and obey Hitler. Jess and the other recruits are shaped and molded into the future baby makers of Nazi Germany. Because of her upbringing Jess knows exactly the path she should take but when her best friend Clementine starts steering her off course Jess finds herself questioning not just her desires but her whole world.

Is it possible that everything she knows has been built on one big lie? Clementine’s revolution pushes Jess into a dark corner and the only way out is to accept that she can’t trust anyone’s truth because ultimately everyone lies.

‘In stronger moments, when I can be honest with myself, I know it can’t be true.’

This deeply intelligent and gripping novel poses one of the biggest and most frightening 'What If?' questions ever and examines through a microscopic lens feminism, sexuality and gender using the power of fiction to hold a mirror up to our own society. Mayhew sensitively analyses everything that determines who we are, our place in the world and allows the reader to consider what lies in the spaces between the past, the present and the future.

‘The moral was always implied and understood. It lived there in the Zwischenraum – that space between.’

 

 

About the author

Julie is an actress turned writer who still acts but mostly writes. 

She is an alumna of the Arvon/Jerwood Mentoring Scheme where she was tutored by Maria McCann.

Julie’s debut novel, Red Ink, was published by Hot Key Books in 2013, and was nominated for the 2014 CILIP Carnegie Medal and shortlisted for the Branford Boase Award 2014. Her second YA/Adult Crossover title, The Big Lie, will be published in August 2015.For radio, Julie has written three plays, including A Shoebox Of Snow which was nominated for Best Drama at the BBC Audio Drama Awards 2012 and shortlisted for the Nick Darke Award 2010 as a work in progress.

Julie is currently attached to Headlong theatre company as part of their first, invitational Writers’ Group.

 

About the reviewer

Rhian was born in Swansea but hasn't stayed put anywhere for very long. She trained as a Drama and English teacher and wrote her first novel during her first few years in teaching.

She got her first publishing deal at 26 and went on to write three more novels for Bloomsbury.
The Boy who drew the Future is her fifth novel and she’s recently finished writing her sixth.  

 She is a National Trust writer in residence, a WoMentoring mentor and a Patron of Reading.

You can follow Rhian on Twitter and on Facebook.

 

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Katy's Pony Challenge, by Victoria Eveleigh

I'm not a natural target for a book for children/young teens about pony-riding. There's the obvious quibble about it being rather more than a year or two since I was in hailing distance of childhood; but quite apart from that, I know very little about horse-riding. I did have a bout of enthusiasm when I was about twelve. This entailed reading Black Beauty and books by Jill Pullein-Thompson, and avidly studying instructions in comics about how to harness/groom/get onto a pony. Eventually I saved my pocket money and went for a lesson. I knew how to mount - of course I did. I'd read all about it. So how come I ended up facing the pony's tail?

It all went downhill from there. Instead of galloping across the moors (which would have been tricky in the South Derbyshire coal fields even if I knew how to gallop), the pony and I plodded unenthusiastically along the road for half an hour, then came back to the stable and said our farewells. Both of us knew this relationship was going nowhere.

Despite this unpromising back-story, I really enjoyed reading Katy's Pony Challenge. It helps that it's set on Exmoor, an area that I'm familiar with and that Victoria Eveleigh knows very well, as she lives and farms there. Reading the book was rather like having a mini holiday there - little details place you firmly in the landscape: Crystals of crunchy snow lingered among the gnarled, charred heather... At the top of the ridge they stopped to let Jacko get his breath back. Sweat had turned his dusty winter coat into slick, feathery curls, and he stood steaming in the ice-cool breeze.

It's a story about friendship, and about finding the things you're good at. Katy's friend Alice has been given an expensive new competition pony, and there's an expectation that she will become a successful and very competitive show jumper. Katy is pleased for her - and perhaps just a touch envious - but she soon begins to notice that Alice does not seem quite as enthralled as she should be.

Katy is also concerned about her Exmoor pony, Trifle, who has recently had a foal. Katy had found Trifle on the moor in a sorry state, and convinced her father to take the pony in. This means that there are now three ponies for Katy to look after - too many; Trifle needs more exercise than Katy has time to give her, and the foal, Tinks, needs to be trained. Then a newcomer to the area, Olivia, asks if her autistic son, James, can spend some time with Katy and the ponies - he's naturally drawn to horses, she says. He and Trifle quickly develop a bond. But for Katy, he's yet another responsibility.

But then she comes across a new way of schooling horses. It's called horse agility, and it requires a very different way of relating to them. James turns out to be remarkably good at it, and Alice is very drawn to it as well. Perhaps this will be the means by which they will find a solution for all their problems...

Any young person who's keen on horses will love this book - I know my daughter would have devoured it when she was younger. Just a word of warning; it's the fourth in a series. It's fine to read by itself, but you might want to buy all four!


For more book reviews, see my blog, A Fool On A Hill






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FOXCRAFT: The Taken, by Inbali Iserles; reviewed by Gillian Philip (plus giveaway!)

“It was always hardest for Fox.” Siffrin, emissary of the fox Elders, tells us so in this enchanting, gripping animal fantasy by Inbali Iserles, the first of a series. “To live free among the furless?” he goes on. “To hunt our prey without being seen? To elude our enemies as they circled us? It is Foxcraft that saved us.”  

Inbali Iserles (one of the Erin Hunter team who writes Survivors) has created a stunning animal world that ranges from the Snowlands to the Wildlands to the Greylands and beyond; it’s one that we see in all its beauty, grimness and terror through the eyes of young Isla, a not-quite-full-grown cub who is torn from her family as the story begins. Or rather, her family – Fa, Ma, Greatma and brother Pirie - is wrenched from her, in an act of terrible violence. By chance, Isla herself escapes, but she sees enough to know that the vicious attackers who destroy her world are foxes, too. The mystery is why they would do such a thing; and Iserles is skilful in giving Isla (and the reader) sinister glimpses of the answer. The hints at a dark-hearted Mage and a secret society of Elder foxes made me hungry to know more.

Of course Isla sets out to find her lost family; and her quest through the dirty, menacing streets of the Greylands – the ‘Great Snarl’, the city of the furless – is one that will call on all her courage, cunning and determination.

Luckily for a young and inexperienced fox, those are not all she has going for her. Siffrin is an enigmatic young stranger who claims to be a friend – but has he come to help her or betray her? Perhaps he simply doesn’t care, because Isla is no more than a means to an end… But what Siffrin does give the frightened youngster is a lesson in foxcraft: an ancient magic that feels profoundly real, and rooted deep in the natural world. If you’ve ever caught a glimpse of a fox, urban or rural, only to blink as it apparently vanishes in shadow, you’ll find foxcraft an all-too-believable kind of magic. 

Iserles has mined a rich vein of folklore to bring us foxes that can blend into thin air, that can mimic the calls of other creatures, that can even shapeshift. There may be other sons and daughters of Canista – dogs that are slaves to the furless humans, and savage wolves that howl and hunt in packs – but foxes are the most enigmatic: wise in foxlore, answering to no creature, standing alone, yet fiercely loyal to family.

The close fox’s-eye view of the narrative brings the reader right into Isla’s skin, feeling her joys as well as her fears. She’s an instantly engaging narrator, and her terror in the city is lightened by her flashbacks to a more innocent, happy cubhood. The supporting cast, from loving brother to vicious assassin, from empty-eyed hench-fox to a terrifyingly cynical and cold-eyed wolf, are drawn with the keen and perceptive eye of a true animal lover. The eponymous Taken – foxes who have had their will stolen by the mysterious Mage – are an enemy to chill the spine, but they can still prick your sympathy gland. Handsome Siffrin became an instant favourite of mine: he’s a combination of arrogance, charisma and clouded motivations who reminded me of Haku in the Hayao Miyazaki movie Spirited Away.

Clearly Inbali Iserles is absurdly talented, because the delightful drawings at each chapter head are her own. She has created haunting characters, a thoroughly exciting quest story and an enticing mystery. And she has combined those with descriptive writing that can raise the hairs on the back of your neck – whether you’re walking with Isla through the fresh wildness of parks, slinking down the city’s gritty, stinking alleys, or dashing with her, panicked, across its mangler-infested deathways.

“Dreams are the beginning,” Isla reminds us, as this part of the story ends. I am delighted that’s as far as they take us. I’m looking forward very much to whatever those dreams are going to bring us next. 

Thanks to the generosity of Scholastic, Awfully Big Reviews has three advance proof copies to give away! Just comment below, and three winners will be chosen at random. Results to be announced here on 1st September.

FOXCRAFT: The Taken by Inbali Iserles 

To be published by Scholastic on 1st October 2015; £5.99

www.gillianphilip.com

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The King of Space by Jonny Duddle - reviewed by Damian Harvey

The King of Space, written and illustrated by Jonny Duddle, has been around for a little while now but it's a book that I missed - and perhaps you did too. Whilst visiting libraries to help promote the Summer Reading Challenge - as well as talking about my own books I also spent time with children to help them choose other books that they might enjoy reading. The King of Space caught my eye and proved to be a very popular choice with readers that were looking for something fun to read but felt reluctant to jump into a bigger book.
 

The King of Space was a perfect choice - especially boys who loved the story, artwork and the format of the book itself. The only thing that might have put them off is that that i found the book placed amongst all of the other picture books so it tends to get missed. While King of Space is a picture book - for me it is one of those real gems... a picture book for older readers.

 

Rex isn't really a naughty boy. He's just a normal boy with big ideas who is tired of living a boring life on Mum and Dad's Moog farm. While all of the other children/aliens at school have little ideas about what they want to be when they grow up, Rex bravely declares that he wants to be the 'KING OF SPACE!' Naturally, all of his classmates laugh at him but Rex is determined to see his plan through.

 

With the help of his mechanically minded friend, Blip, Rex builds a huge 'WARBOT' that will enable him to achieve his goal. Then one night whilst Mum and Dad think Rex is having a sleepover at his friends house, Rex and his Warbot 'crush all resistance in the Western Spiral' and Rex declares himself King of Space. And just to be 'on the safe side' he kidnaps Emperor Bob's daughter.

 

As you can well imagine, the Emperor and the Intergalactic Alliance aren't happy with Rex's behaviour - he's been a very naughty boy - so a huge fleet of spaceships converge on Rex's house. Rex does the only thing he can an rushes in to tell Mum and Dad what he's done and that he doesn't want to play anymore. It is, of course, all left to Mum to sort out the trouble. But is this an end to Rex's plans???

The picture book/comic book style of this works very well and it certainly has plenty of appeal for older readers. There is lots of humour that will appeal to the older readers too, whilst also striking a very familiar chord with adults.

The King of Space is lots of fun and it's a book I will be recommending again.

You can visit Jonny Duddle's website www.jonny-duddle.com/

Damian Harvey can be found at www.damianharvey.co.uk
Twitter @damianjharvey
 

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The Freedom Maze by Delia Sherman reviewed by Lynda Waterhouse

I have been spending a lot of time looking at pictorial representations of mazes and labyrinths and so it was the title of this novel that first caught my eye when I was making one of my many trips to Foyles.

The first sentence drew me in,

Sophie Martineau looked out of the window of her mother’s 1954 Ford station wagon and watched her life slide behind her into the past.

From that moment I was transfixed by the story of thirteen year old Sophie Martineau’s summer in Louisiana in the 1960s. Her parents have just divorced and her mother is trying to earn a living and study to become an accountant in the evenings. So Sophie has to stay with her grandmother and her aunt on the dilapidated former sugar plantation.

America in the 1960s is beautifully and uncompromisingly evoked in the novel. Sophia’s beautiful mother has been brought up as a southern belle and who has told Sophie to, ‘never under any circumstances speak to any Negro man she didn’t already know.’

Sophie spends her time reading and sunbathing until an encounter with a mysterious creature in the overgrown maze offers her an opportunity to have the adventure that she craves as well as an escape from the painful feelings she has towards her mother and her father, who has suddenly remarried. Sophie finds herself transported through time to the planation as it was in 1860.

The experience is nothing like the bookish Sophie imagines it is going to be like. Her own ancestors mistake her for a slave and she is made to work in various roles on the plantation.  She slowly begins to realise that she may not be able to return home. There is real jeopardy and pain as Sophie grows and matures and helps others to escape to a freedom that may be denied her.

This is a beautifully written book that took Delia Sherman eighteen years and twenty seven drafts to perfect. It is a master - or should I say mistress - class in how to write a coming of age, a timeslip and a historical novel which highlights race and gender issues that sadly still resonate. Today.

ISBN978-1-4721-1752-6 published by Corsair

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Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee - review by Dawn Finch

From the jacket.....

Maycomb, Alabama. Twenty-six-year-old Jean Louise Finch—"Scout"—returns home from New York City to visit her aging father, Atticus. Set against the backdrop of the civil rights tensions and political turmoil that were transforming the South, Jean Louise's homecoming turns bittersweet when she learns disturbing truths about her close-knit family, the town, and the people dearest to her. Memories from her childhood flood back, and her values and assumptions are thrown into doubt. 

The publication of this book (and the controversy surrounding both it and Lee's life) can't have escaped anyone's notice. Written in the 1950s, Lee says that she always saw Go Set A Watchman as a companion book to To Kill A Mockingbird. In fact she wrote them both at roughly the same time, but actually submitted Go Set A Watchman to her publishers first. Somehow the manuscript was lost and it was not re-discovered until late 2014 when publication was initiated. The book has been packaged as an adult book but, with To Kill A Mockingbird still firmly on the National Curriculum, I can see how Go Set A Watchman could neatly fit into the shelf of books that are recommended to young adult readers in their later teens. I think they should read it, not because they should study it, but because they should simply read it and make their own decisions.

The language is often shocking (and there is frequent use of the N word) and the issues covered are powerful and controversial (including incest, murder, extreme racism, and gender subjugation) and so I'd recommend that parents and teachers read it first before recommending to younger teens. Over-study can ruin a book, but this could easily be offered to young adults who enjoyed To Kill A Mockingbird and want to know what happened next. I was one of those young readers who was forced to analyse every tiny detail of To Kill A Mockingbird in school, and therefore I had a somewhat jaded image of Lee's writing and I wasn't going to be influenced by the hype and buzz surrounding the publication of Go Set A Watchman. In fact I wasn't prepared to enjoy it, but I did.

The book is actually quite beautiful, but in a deeply sombre way. Jean Louise's story is enigmatically portrayed and the prose draws you in from the start. None of your rigid "show, don't tell" here as we are told of Jean Louise's world and we accompany her on her journey back to her childhood home via highly descriptive flashbacks. Atticus as an old man is not the person we think we knew when we met him back in To Kill A Mockingbird, but it turns out that we only knew him through the eyes of an eight year old. Scout is grown up and now we meet her as Jean Louise, and the rosy-glow of her remembered childhood gets grubbier and more brutal page by page.

She arrives in her home town to visit her elderly father two years on from the death of her brother, and now sees everything through the filter of her adult eyes and perceptions. The truths she uncovers are far from new to a reader with any knowledge of the period and location, and one does wonder how a well educated young woman like Jean Louise has been able to ignore the glaringly obvious up till now. How Jean Louise reacts to these revelations about her home town creates a deeply sad reminder of how we should never go back, and of the dark shadows that can lurk in our history.

There are some passages that feel rather tiresome and over-explanatory, and in places the book does feel like it needs a good broom-sweeping editor. I'm not convinced that most readers will enjoy some of the longer chunks of scene-setting explanations about how Alabama and its overlapping families fitted into the Civil Rights Movement. It seems that Jean Louise does need these things pointed out to her (in fact the men around her take a lot of time to patronise her and to point out that she knows nothing). It is possible that teen readers (who may not yet have studied the background of the American Civil Rights Movement and the NAACP) will find these passages more interesting and enlightening, but to me these sections feel as if they hinder the smooth flow of the story. I would have liked the history to trickle out via the plot, and not by long wordy explanations.

All in all I felt drawn in to Jean Louise's world and I wanted to return not to her adulthood, but to her childhood naivety. I suspect we have all had those moments in our lives when we are hit with the reality of something we never noticed before, or perhaps a truth that we never wanted to admit. Even though the experiences that she has are (thankfully) a world away from those most of us will go through, the melancholy remembrance of lost halcyon days is perhaps something we all share.

Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee is published by William Heinemann (isbn 9781785150289)
Publication date 14 July 2015


Review by Dawn Finch
Vice President CILIP
CWIG Committee Member
Children's author and librarian
www.dawnfinch.com



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LEIF FROND by JOAN LENNON. Reviewed by Ann Turnbull.

LEIF FROND AND QUICKFINGERS

LEIF FROND AND THE VIKING GAMES


"My name is Frond. Leif Frond."

Leif is the youngest and smallest member of a large family of Viking farmers. His ambition is to be a hero - an aim constantly thwarted by others, in particular his elder sister Thorhalla who always needs help with the laundry just when he wants to do something exciting. Leif would much rather spend time with Queue the Artificer, the clan's inventor. And in Quickfingers Leif and the inventor help to outwit and capture a thief and solve a mystery - in a story with a surprisingly complex plot that keeps you guessing right to the end.

In The Viking Games Harald Blogfeld arrives in a longboat with his band of Viking raiders to take part in the Midsummer Games. Harald is looking for a replacement crew member, and all the young men of Frondfell are keen to show off their strength - including Leif. Also on the lookout for a replacement - a husband, in this case - is the formidable Widow Brownhilde, who has her sights on Leif's father. Can Leif see off the widow and win at the Games?

I'd never read one of Joan Lennon's books before, but I always enjoy her blogs and other writings, so when I came across Leif Frond and Quickfingers in my local library I immediately grabbed it. I was not disappointed. These short books are a lot of fun, with nods to James Bond and chapter titles like "Woad Rage". Tucked in amongst the mayhem is quite a lot about life as most Vikings lived it - not longboats and raids, but farming and storytelling and mixing dye. The combination of adventure and word-play will entertain older readers as well as the youngest. And with so many promising characters bumping into each other at every turn, a series must surely be in the offing? Let's hope so.

Illustrated in black and white by Brendan Kearney.
Publisher: A & C Black, 2014.  92pp.
ISBNs:   978-1-4729-0453-9      Quickfingers
               978-1-4729-0462-1      The Viking Games

Reviewed by Ann Turnbull.   www.annturnbull.com

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THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PYJAMAS by JOHN BOYNE, revisited and reviewed by Pauline Francis

 

I went to hear John Boyne speak at this year’s Hay Festival because it was a special occasion, chaired by festival director Peter Florence himself, to re-visit this novel on its tenth birthday.

I love this book and I decided that I’d like to re-visit it with them.

The idea came to John one Tuesday and he wrote without stopping for four days and nights – kept awake by coffee - until he was forced out with friends to celebrate his birthday. Those four days gave him the essence of the novel, which he wrote and re-wrote over the next nine months with few changes to the story itself.

He felt that he’d written something very special, which is a wonderful feeling and doesn’t happen with every book, as authors know to their cost.

I didn’t know this, but the first review said that it was a novel of breath-taking vulgarity!

This comment took my breath away. John said he was crushed by it and began to doubt his work.

Usually a book reviewer will sum up the story. I’m not going to do that. Instead, I’m quoting the dust jacket on the first hardback copies: “The story is very difficult to describe. Usually we give some clues about the book on the jacket, but in this case we think that would spoil the reading of the book. We think that it is important that you start to read without knowing what it is about. If you do start to read this book, you will go on a journey with a nine-year old boy called Bruno. And sooner or later, you will arrive with Bruno at a fence.”

I know that much of the criticism came from the book’s apparent concentration on a young, blond German boy, who seems to be more important than the thousands of Jews who died in the holocaust.

But I think that this is missing the point. So I’m going to applaud the book jacket again. It ends: “Fences like this exist all over the world. We hope you never have to encounter such a fence.”

Brilliant!

This book’s importance is in no doubt. At the end of the session, Peter Florence presented John with a special award: the novel has sold one million copies in the UK.

Well done, John Boyne. Your novel is on its way to becoming a classic in a world where fences such as the one that Bruno met are still being built, rather than being torn down.

Let us hope that if it is being read in a hundred years time – as a true classic – that readers will shake their heads in disbelief that such fences ever existed.

That is the true legacy of this wonderful book.

Pauline Francis

www.paulinefrancis.co.uk

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A TIME FOR TREASON: the Gunpowder Plot by ANN TURNBULL. Reviewed by Adèle Geras

As ever when I'm reviewing, I have to start with full disclosure. Ann Turnbull is a friend of mine and moreover we have both contributed books to the Historical House series published by Usborne.

As well as being my friend, though, Ann is undoubtedly one of the very best historical novelists around and her books should be much better known and much more admired. She is one of those writers who is under publicised and under appreciated and there are a lot of them about. Anything I can do to highlight work by such writers, I will do and if I'm perceived as biased, then so be it. I urge anyone to try books like  NO SHAME, NO FEAR and ALICE IN LOVE AND WAR  and  you will, I'm sure, agree with me and start spreading the word about Ann's novels. 

A TIME FOR TREASON  is for much younger readers than the titles mentioned above which are YA and would be suitable for adults too. The National Archives series is a clever initiative which aims to introduce readers to the main 'stories' in the history of our country. Ann has already written two titles (A CROSS ON THE DOOR: about the Plague and A CITY IN FLAMES: about the Great Fire of London) in the series and this one is about the plot by Guy Fawkes and his cronies to blow up the Houses of Parliament.

So far, so familiar. What Turnbull does most adroitly is bring a very complicated story of religious fervour, discrimination, turbulence and violence into a scope that an eight- year -old will understand. She does this by telling the tale through the eyes of a young girl, Eliza and her cousin Lucy who comes to visit London during these dangerous times. Lucy has a taste for intrigue of all kinds and she draws Eliza into exploring sinister goings - on in a neighbouring house. The historical detail is there, but gently and delicately sketched in, so that the young reader is not burdened by dates and accounts of conflicts in the past, but drawn into a tale of day- to -day adventure which culminates in the arrest of Guy Fawkes.

A cat plays a major part in the action, and animals are always a good way to hook very young readers into the plot. The relationship between Eliza and Lucy is both touching and humorous and enlivened by letters and inner thoughts as well as dialogue. The book is very short and easy to read but within those limits, Turnbull's prose is lucid and in period without being olde-worlde in an off-putting way. This is how the book begins and it's a master class in how to convey a lot of information elegantly and in very few words: 

"'Nothing ever happens in London,' sighed Eliza.
She put down her needlework and looked out of the window at the wet, wind-shaken garden, where yellow leaves were swirling.
'You're missing your cousin, aren't you?' her governess, Miss Perks said. She frowned at Eliza's crossed threads. 'Unpick that and do it again.'" 

I do urge  teachers to buy a copy of this and its companion books by Turnbull in the National Archives series for their classroom bookshelf. Reading historical fiction is the best possible way to enthuse pupils about the past and you can't do better than stocking up with Ann Turnbull novels.


A TIME FOR TREASON:
published in pbk by A&C Black (£4.99)
ISBN: 9781472908476

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IMPOSSIBLE! by Michelle Magorian, reviewed by Pippa Goodhart

Most of us know Michelle Magorian best for her very first book, 'Goodnight Mr Tom', winner of the Guardian Children's Book Prize, and a story that has gone beyond book form into the theatre and as a film.  It's a wonderful book about a boy, a dog, and an old man, brought together by the evacuation of children during the Second World War. 

I've also loved Magorian's 'Back Home', 'A Little Love Song', and 'A Spoonful of Jam', and there are more books which I must read.  But the very latest to be published is 'Impossible!', which I've just finished reading.  I've thoroughly enjoyed it, partly because you feel Michelle Magorian so very thoroughly enjoying herself so much as she wrote it!

This story includes familiar Michelle Magorian elements ... the child away from home, surviving in a hostile place, the love of theatre, and a bygone age.  It's set in the late 1950s, and follows twelve year old Josie as she starts at a stuffy drama school.  Josie is from a different background from most of the other children.  Her family have all had to help in order to get her this chance to join the acting profession, so she can't let on to them that she's hating the place.  Josie doesn't fit the mould.  She's a cockney in a place that values RP, and she's a proper tomboy, wanting to play boy's parts, when her teachers are trying to teach her to be ladylike. 

The first hundred or so pages of this long book do sprawl as we meet a huge cast of characters and veer from one bit of story to another.  But then the story gets into its stride, becoming a thriller that takes us into the new alternative theatrical world of Joan Littlewood, and London's docklands (pre-Docklands, of course), in a story of kidnapping, shootings, drugs, bullying, drownings, and good old fashioned come-uppances. 

This is a world of radiograms, Premium Bonds, sputnicks, cruetts, snobbishness about ITV, and more to puzzle modern children but evoke smiles of recognition in older readers.  Its a story about different theories of how to act on stage, making it a fascinating read for any, old or young, who are interested in drama.  And it's a story about a resourceful girl who is different from the rest, and a large cast of larger than life characters amongst whom us older readers will spot familiar names.  It's great fun! 

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The Lost and the Found by Cat Clarke

                                       The Lost and the Found by Cat Clarke

LOST.
When six-year-old Laurel Logan was abducted, the only witness was her younger sister. Faith's childhood was dominated by Laurel's disappearance - from her parents' broken marriage and the constant media attention to dealing with so-called friends who only ever wanted to talk about her sister. 

FOUND.
Thirteen years later, a young woman is found in the garden of the Logans' old house, disorientated and clutching the teddy bear Laurel was last seen with. Laurel is home at last, safe and sound. Faith always dreamed of getting her sister back, without ever truly believing it would happen. But a disturbing series of events leaves Faith increasingly isolated and paranoid, and before long she begins to wonder if everything that's lost can be found again...

 

Review

This (shockingly) is my first Cat Clarke book but certainly won’t be my last. Now I’ve discovered this talented author I get to work my way through her impressive back catalogue and catch up with the rest of the world.

The Lost and the Found isn't a read you can easily forget, not even when you are asleep. It has been quite a while since I dreamt about characters in a book but Faith and Laurel crept into my subconscious every night until I finished reading.

The story focuses on Faith whose sister Laurel was abducted thirteen years ago. Much of Faith’s childhood has been overshadowed by this tragedy and the following years which have been filled with campaigns for her sister’s return and her mother’s obsession with her missing daughter.

As the only witness to the crime much of Faith’s identity is tied up in her role as Laurel’s sister, rather than being allowed to find out who she is in her own right. When the two sisters are reunited things start to get very interesting as Clarke explores sibling rivalry, relationships, family dynamic and asks some scary questions about trust.

Clarke seamlessly pulls us into the story by peeling back the layers of truth until we get to the heart of the novel which will definitely bring tears to your eyes. This balance of emotion and empathy is often very difficult to get right in books and much easier in film but Clarke pulls it off. Throughout the novel the reader is encouraged to stop and consider how we think about (and forget about) missing children and their families once the media spotlight has moved on. Clarke reminds us that for the families of missing children moving on simply isn't an option.

In The Lost and the Found Clarke explores every parent's worst nightmare  - your child being taken -  then follows this up with the dream come true scenario of that child (now a teenager) returning home but all is not as it seems and to say any more would result in spoilers. All you need to know is this is a compelling story in which you find yourself understanding a range of perspectives conveying the different ways we experience and deal with loss and hope.

About the author

Cat was born in Zambia and brought up in Edinburgh and Yorkshire, which has given her an accent that tends to confuse people.

Cat has written non-fiction books about exciting things like cowboys, sharks and pirates, and now writes YA novels. She lives in Edinburgh with her partner, two ninja cats and two decidedly non-ninja cocker spaniels. Cat is represented by Julia Churchill at A.M.Heath.
Cat's website

You can follow Cat on Twitter and Facebook.

 

About the reviewer

Rhian was born in Swansea but hasn't stayed put anywhere for very long. She trained as a Drama and English teacher and wrote her first novel during her first few years in teaching.

She got her first publishing deal at 26 and went on to write three more novels for Bloomsbury. 
The Boy who drew the Future is her fifth novel and she’s recently finished writing her sixth.  

 She is a National Trust writer in residence, a WoMentoring mentor and a Patron of Reading.

You can follow Rhian on twitter on Twitter and on Facebook.

 

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THE DISAPPEARANCE OF TOM PILE, by Ian Beck. Reviewed by Saviour Pirotta

Title: The Disappearance of Tom Pile
Author: Ian Beck
Publisher: Random House/Corgi
Year: hb 2014/pb 2015

I have to admit that I've always been a big fan of Ian Beck's work. His picture books have a pastel-hued retro quality that is very comforting and were always a hit with the kids I bought them for.

I also loved his Tom Trueheart novels, firmly based in a fairytale world that seemed reassuring in its familairity but innovative at the same time.

His latest series, called The Casebooks of Captain Holloway, is yet another facet of his ouevre. I've just finished the first installment, The Disappearance of Tom Pile, which I devoured in one long sitting. If Stephen King were to write a children's book this would be it. It has all the ingredients of a bestseller and a resonance that will stay with readers long after they have finished the story. Here is a tight plot with engaging characters, set against a well-researched backdrop of World War II.

In 1900 a boy called Tom Pile is out poaching with a local miscreant. They shoot and wound a white stag, a rash action the boy regrets in an instant. He rushes to the wounded beast and seconds later, a dazzling light from the sky whisks him up into the air. He returns to earth what he thinks is a few moments later but is in fact 1940, right in the middle of World War II. In his pocket is a rectangular piece of metal unlike anything that has been manufactured anywhere on the planet...

I can't reveal what happens next. Suffice to say that a whole list of diverse characters gets involved in the mystery.  A corporal with 'special' powers, a charismatic captain who is also an investigator of paranormal phenomena, a German spy and a heroic Polish soldier. Or is the latter a secret spy for the nazis...?

The story is told in the first person by the corporal, a londoner called Jack Carmody, and includes files and transcripts in the style of King's celebrated Carrie. The ending is incredible!

The book also includes a peek into the next adventure of Carmody, Holloway and Tom Pile. It's called The Miraculous Return of Annick Garel. Can't wait to get my mitts on it.

Saviour Pirotta

My next book THE GHOSTS WHO DANCED is out on the 3rd September.

Follow me on twitter @spirotta
Like me on facebook https://www.facebook.com/spirotta
Website http://www.spirotta.com

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Silver Skin, by Joan Lennon - reviewed by Sue Purkiss

This isn't just a GOOD book - it's a VERY GOOD book. I'm quite certain of this, because I've read it twice. I read it when I first got it, but stupidly didn't write the review of it then; so today I had to remind myself of it - and was soon engrossed, and read it the whole way through again.

The novel concerns a time-traveller, Rab. He is from the future - a future where space is at a premium, but people live contentedly together; in part because something is put in the water to depress their sexual and other urges. They are protected against the harsher realities of life; they feel no pain, for instance, because each person has a sort of technological guardian called a Com, which protects them and sorts out any problems or glitches.

Rab's mother gives him the latest gadget - a Silver Skin - which will enable him to travel into the past and get lots of useful information for his research project. He decides on the 19th century, but a violent storm interferes with navigation, and he finds himself much, much further back - in Skara Brae, at the point where the Stone Age gives way to the Bronze Age.

The story is briefly, but cleverly framed in the 19th century, but the heart of it is in the Stone Age, and in the relationships between Rab, a girl called Cait, and a formidable wise woman called Voy. All these characters are beautifully drawn. Rab and Cait are both, in a sense, outsiders. They are drawn to each other, but - given the circumstances - things are not easy between them. Voy is easy to dislike, but we are shown what her life has been, and how much she misses her man, Gairstay, and so we begin to understand her. The book is suffused with a sense of the place in which it is set; the villagers think that Rab is a selkie, half-man, half-seal, and the sea is a constant presence.

The writing is lovely. Here's one little example. This is the 19th century; there is a storm, and Mrs Trevelyan is unable to sleep: "She watched the little flame thrashing on the candle wick and waited for the morning." Thrashing is not a word I would have thought of using, yet it paints the picture of the flickering flame far more effectively than guttering, or indeed flickering - both of which would have been more obvious choices. And the sentence is just beautifully balanced; it works so well.

The earth is entering a cooler phase, and the people are afraid. Without the sun, they cannot perform the ceremonies that enable the dead to depart in peace; they are aware that things are changing, and that the future may be worse than the present - which, of course, has resonances for us. Is the solution which has enabled humanity to survive into Rab's age a viable one for us - would we be prepared to accept the sacrifices it entails?

This really is a book which satisfies on a great many levels. It would be great to study in class - if the curriculum allows!

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THE RIVER SINGERS by Tom Moorhouse; reviewed by Gillian Philip

Tom Moorhouse works as an ecologist at the Zoology Department of Oxford University. I didn't know that till the end of this book, but in hindsight – well, of course that makes sense. There are many enchantments in this book, but the author's love for, and knowledge of, his subject is one of the standouts.

Animal fantasy can't help but be anthropomorphic; it's part of the deal. And despite the usual negative connotations of the word, it's not a bad thing. The fun lies in engaging a human reader by merging human emotions, outlooks and motivations with animal ones; the trick is avoiding sentimentality. Good animal fantasy, paradoxically, keeps it real. Tom Moorhouse pulls it off – and how.

As the story begins, young water vole Sylvan – who until now has known only his home burrow and the company of his mother, brother and two sisters – has only just been introduced to the big wide world. We see this new world as he does: a place of excitement, beauty and constant peril. The vole's-eye view of the narrative is consistent and utterly convincing, and the descriptive passages are beautiful. There's real magic in the song of the Great River, Sinethis – part natural environment, part life-spirit and part god. But the everyday pleasures and dangers of life as a small and vulnerable herbivore are about to be eclipsed by a new and alien horror – one that will shatter the young voles' world.

Sylvan himself is a terrific hero, adventurous and determined. It's the lot of voles to be a "sacrifice": at the mercy of the very river that sustains their lives, and victims of a multitude of predators. But when a mink destroys their lives, and it falls to young Sylvan to lead his family to a new home, he does it with a dogged courage and loyalty that would make any young reader fall in love with him (not to mention this older one). The young voles' adventures are heart-stopping, and the pace is lickety-split, but never at the cost of vivid portrayals of either the countryside or the characters.

The four vole siblings are distinct characters, and their interactions and relationships are a delight. There's plenty of banter and bickering that would be familiar to human brothers and sisters, but there's also real, deep affection and protectiveness. The supporting cast are no less entertainingly drawn: Fodur the rat is a star as soon as he appears. And the adult female water voles – the ones who establish territory, and hang grimly onto it in the face of not just predators but bitchy encroaching neighbours – are a hoot. Mistresses Valera, Lily and Marjoram are formidable matriarchs, with more a touch of the Mapp & Lucias. They're quite as terrifying as any heron, fox or king rat, but they're far funnier.

A lovely addition, and an integral part of the story, are the illustrations by Simon Mendez. The text is generously interspersed with drawings that evoke all the excitement, atmosphere and beauty of the riverbank, marsh and forest.

This is a story of family, courage and survival: of fighting on and maintaining hope in the face of despair. It has all the humanity a young reader could ask for, but told in the form and being and voice of water voles.  I was with these courageous little herbivores all the way, and I know a whole lot more about them now than I did before. Whether child or adult: if you hanker nostalgically for the immersive animal adventure of Watership Down, you'll be overjoyed to discover The River Singers. 

The River Singers by Tom Moorhouse; OUP £6.99

www.gillianphilip.com


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Silent Saturday by Helen Grant - Reviewed by Tamsyn Murray

The bells are not ringing in seven year old Veerle de Keyser's Flemish village. It's Silent Saturday, the only day of the year when the church bells don't ring, and she's running away from an argument at home. She creeps into the church next door and is dared to climb the tower by schoolmate Kris Verstraeten. From there, they see the most horrific sight - a blood-drenched killer, exulting over the body of a child. Veerle starts screaming.

Fast forward ten years and Veerle doesn't think about that day much. She's too busy trying to cope with her anxiety-ridden mother, whose obsession with everything Veerle does is both oppressive and suffocating. So when she meets Kris again, and he invites her to join a secret group called the Koekoeken, she doesn't need much tempting. Exploring unoccupied properties gives her the kind of rush she hasn't felt for years and the fact that it's illegal only raises the thrill factor. But there's a killer on the loose: someone is stalking the Koekoeken, picking them off one by one. He is The Hunter and it's only a matter of time before he turns his attention to Veerle and Kris...

Silent Saturday is the first in the Forbidden Spaces trilogy, aimed at teens (and adults - oh yes, adults) aged 14+. It had me hooked from the very start - Helen Grant's prose is beautifully spare, not a word wasted but still deliciously elegant and descriptive. For example, when she first introduces Kris, she writes:

'The local telephone directory was full of Verstraetens but everyone knew who you meant if you talked about those ones...'

which sums his black sheep background up perfectly. He's exactly the kind of character I love: mysterious, brooding, daring and flawed. He brings out the best and the worst in Veerle, with whom I had huge sympathy and liked very much too, as she struggles against her mother's tightening cocoon. Kris and Veerle make some very bad choices but they are always logical, always plausible, even if I was willing them not to do some of the things they do. And the killer made my skin crawl - a truly terrifying monster.

I originally wanted to review all three books in the trilogy - The Demons of Ghent and Urban Legends are both just as thrilling and make the kind of breathtaking journey I wanted to begin again the moment I'd finished. But I couldn't review all three without spoiling the first and so I've settle on Silent Saturday as a taste for the other books. They are all equally brilliant. I especially enjoyed knowing that there were two more books to come - quite often, I don't want to reach the end of a story because I don't want my time with those characters to end. With Silent Saturday, I found myself gobbling up the pages, desperate to know what happened next, with the delicious safety net of knowing there was more to come. I read Urban Legends with a kind of sadness, unwilling to say goodbye to its characters. But the moment I picked up Silent Saturday to write this review I was hooked again, so I know I'll be revisiting them, admiring the unusual settings that made me want to visit Belgium and no doubt shivering with fear all over again. And of course I'll be recommending these books to everyone over the age of fourteen - although I don't like to stipulate an age normally, there are a lot of exquisitely described but by their very nature quite graphic crimes in the books which I feel makes them unsuitable for younger teens.

The Forbidden Spaces trilogy is published by Random House.

Tamsyn Murray writes for all age ranges, from picture books to teens. Her latest book is Completely Cassidy: Star Reporter and her website is tamsynmurray.co.uk




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