Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds, illustrated by Chris Priestley - review by Dawn Finch

First the blurb...

AND THEN THERE WERE SHOTS
Everybody
ran,
ducked, 
hid, tucked
themselves tight.

Pressed our lips to the
pavement and prayed
the boom, followed by 
the buzz of a bullet,
didn't meet us.

After Will's brother is shot in a gang crime, he knows the next steps. Don't cry. Don't snitch. Get revenge. So he gets in the lift with Shawn's gun, determined to follow The Rules. Only when the lift door opens, Buck walks in, Will's friend who died years ago. And Dani, who was shot years before that. As more people from his past arrive, Will has to ask himself if he really knows what he's doing.

I read a lot of books - hundreds of them every year, but it's not often that a book leaves me speechless. I read Long Way Down shortly after it was published in January, and it has taken me this long to review it because it was hard to find the words. In that time I've been sharing it with everyone I meet and telling them that if they only buy one book this year, it should be this one.

There have been a few verse books hit the shelves over the last few years, and some of them have been excellent, some have not. It is not only a difficult format to master, but it is also incredibly difficult to sell and to get young readers to take a chance on. So many readers feel that poetry is not for them, and feel excluded by the format. Long Way Down is the book to challenge that.

Reynolds' free and fluid verse is engaging and captures the reader from the opening lines. He writes with a living ease that feels real, and honest. This is the voice of youth, and anger, and it speaks directly to the reader. This is not the sound of pretentiousness or of fusty academia, this is the voice of fear, and hate, and sadness and grief. Will is real and in this verse we know him, and we understand him, and through this we understand the plight and situation of the young people who walk in his shoes.

Detail - art by Chris Priestley

The book is a powerful package with the verse supported by Chris Priestley's characteristically superb illustrations. Darkness oozes from scratchy images of Will's life. Frozen moments of memories, wisps of the past and the horrors of the present. Inky flashes of bullets, guns, body bags and fragments of the life of a boy who has been swept away into this terrible world.

This is not only a great book and a great read, it is also one of those very rare things - it is an important book.

Long Way Down is written by Jason Reynolds and illustrated by Chris Priestley
Published by Faber and Faber
ISBN - 978 0571335121

Reviewed by Dawn Finch, author and librarian.
www.dawnfinch.com
@dawnafinch

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Taken, by Rosemary Hayes, reviewed by Pauline Francis

 

I have known Rosemary Hayes – and her novels – for many years. When she published my first novel, she gave up an entire day to edit it with me. That detailed Master Class has stood me in good stead ever since.

The cover of Taken, with its butterfly motif and open hand, makes the reader think instantly about freedom – and therefore, its opposite – lack of freedom. And this freedom has as much to do with mental freedom as much as physical.

Kelly’s father disappeared four years ago, when she was ten years old. It was thought that he had committed suicide, although his body was never found. Kelly has found it very difficult to accept his death.  She has been very much a prisoner in her mind ever since.

Is her father dead? If not, where is he? Did she see him just now in the trees at the park or was it her imagination playing tricks because it’s Autumn again, the time of the year he disappeared?

Kelly confides in her best friend, Lizzie, who is dismayed.

“What if Kelly is losing it again?” she asks herself.

As soon as Kelly glimpses (or thinks she glimpses) her father, she loses her freedom again – the freedom to be honest with her mother, brother, Gran and Lizzie. They are desperate to put the past behind them. She has to go it alone, until she confides in her new friend, Jack.

Events in this novel gather pace quickly, as secrets and lies pile up, forcing Kelly to go in search of the truth. But, as so often in real life, the truth hurts.

Hayes weaves the ups and downs of teenage life into this mystery story and it is uplifting to see the increasing closeness between Kelly and her family. I found the scenes with brother Nat tender and convincing. Kelly’s Gran is an especially intriguing and well drawn character.  Although Kelly calls her “a neurotic temperamental nightmare,” it is Lizzie who leads us to the heart of her character. Cleverly, Kelly’s absent father is constantly present in everybody’s thoughts – especially the reader’s. There is an ever-increasing contrast between the gentle artist father Kelly remembers and the person she doesn’t know at all.

Taken is a well-constructed story told by a very experienced author who knows just when – and how- to increase the tension. The twist at the end is clever and poignant - and offers some hope and stability at last for Kelly. But it does mean that she will have to live with some degree of uncertainty – as will the reader.

Hayes says: “Ransom are selling it as YA (12+) which I think is about right. Although it is (I hope) very easy to read, there is some violence towards the end – and some kissing, too.”

This is a timely novel, reminding us of the threat of terrorism that we all face. Kelly’s sacrifice is as great as her father’s and all those who are working to make our world safe. We should not forget that there must be many Kellys in the real world.

Pauline Francis www.paulinefrancis.co.uk

 

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UNDER WATER by Marisa Reichardt, reviewed by Pauline Francis

I chose this debut novel because of this sentence on the front cover: “Sometimes the safest place to be is underwater.” I was intrigued because I really don't like water at all. The hard cover on the right is even more disturbing to me, so I've shown you both.

Morgan is seventeen, lives in California and used to be a great swimmer, until a terrible event at school made her afraid to leave her apartment.

Sadly, we’ve become used to reading about school massacres, even used to reading about yet another loner who has taken revenge on his rejecting world. Reinhardt takes us in into new territory: what happens to the survivors? How do they recover from their trauma? Life can never be the same again, so how does a young person grow into a new one? Morgan is such a survivor. We know this early on. The tension lies in not knowing exactly what happened to her.

This novel skilfully and slowly takes us into Morgan’s mind as it is written in a very sparing present tense and first person, like a mental diary. Just when the reader is beginning to get the measure of her and her progress, thanks to her therapist, Brenda, a new thread of the trauma floats to the surface. The reader is constantly asking, ‘Is she going to get over this?’

Morgan begins her recovery when a new boy moves in next door. But this isn’t a love-cures-all novel. It’s much more subtle than that. The boy, Evan, connects Morgan to the world outside that she misses and wants to return to. And Reinhardt takes pains to point out that Morgan has to do the hard work every day, reading the mantra stuck onto the kitchen wall:  

1. Breathe 2. You’re are OK. 3. You’re not dying.

Nobody can get better for her.

“’Are you proud of yourself? Brenda asks.

‘I guess.’

‘I want you to own it, Morgan.’

‘Yes.’”

I very much liked the introduction of Morgan’s car, a classic (1957) matador-red Bel Air, left to her by her grandfather. It’s a strong character and adds a dark twist to the day of the massacre, to Morgan’s final revelation.

I did find Morgan’s family situation depressing: her father suffers from war-related mental health problems; some might say it is unnecessary, as are Evan’s own family issues. But as forgiveness and acceptance are at the heart of this novel, Morgan has to forgive her father as well as the loner who carries out the massacre.

This is an honest and gutsy novel that I would recommend far and wide – to anybody suffering the trauma of physical and mental abuse - and to their teachers, parents, carers and counsellors.

Pauline Francis www.paulinefrancis.co.uk

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HORIZON ALPHA: PREDATORS OF EDEN by D.W. Vogel; reviewed by Gillian Philip

Dinosaurs in space. DINOSAURS IN SPACE!

I could just leave my review there, because let's face it, that is an awesome enough premise, but that would be doing this book a great disservice. The book opens as our protagonist Caleb sets out on a dangerous mission; but there's some unsettling history to the way his small human community met the dinosaurs.

The calamity that has destroyed Planet Earth is, for once, not the consequence of humanity's misdeeds: it's simply a giant cosmic accident. Mercury wobbles in its orbit; Jupiter's gravitational pull alters; Earth's scientists realise they have eighty years to save what's left of humanity. And that's it. From that terrifying moment, it's been a race against time to build four Horizon spaceships that will carry a small sample of humanity to distant, unknown worlds. One of the ships, Gamma, never gets out of the solar system; on the others, generations live and die without setting foot on solid ground.

Horizon Alpha is the first to reach a habitable planet, Tau Ceti e. Horizons Beta and Delta are still somewhere out there, our narrator Caleb assumes: still speeding across unimaginable distances in search of a home. That's a melancholy enough ghost in the story, but because of an explosion as the shuttles are loading, Horizon Alpha is left a wreck in space. Now it orbits Ceti, a spectral and eerie presence that Caleb can't forget – not least because his own father died there, saving as many as he could.

The sheer desperation of the survivors makes this book a nerve-shredding fight for survival from the outset. They're not well-equipped; they have no means of escape; they simply have to endure, and scavenge what they can from the planet's surface and from the wreckage of other shuttles. They can't even be sure of keeping their camp's protective electric fence powered up. And boy, do they need that electric fence...

The creatures that live on this planet aren't Earth dinosaurs, Caleb emphasises; they're what evolved on Ceti instead. Some of them are exactly like ours (what's a dinosaur story without a T-Rex or two?); others are monsters that are entirely native to Ceti. And what monsters – the highly intelligent and terrifying 'Wolves' (called that only because they're grey, and hunt in packs); the motionless, apparently somnolent Crabs, which lie perfectly camouflaged till they lunge to snap a traveller in two; Gilas, creatures that only have to bite once...

The dinosaurs clearly can't be allowed to breach Eden's fence; so fifteen-year old Caleb (who has already lost a brother as well as a father) is chosen for a military sortie, to retrieve a prized power core from a crashed shuttle. Of course, too much can go wrong on this planet; for the mission's own shuttle flight, it goes quickly, violently wrong. Only six members of the party survive the crash.

The good news: they swiftly find the old shuttle wreckage and its precious power core. The bad news: they have to make their way back to their settlement, Eden, on foot and with barely any supplies. And given the hostile environment of Ceti and its native fauna, the expedition becomes a classic, nail-biting, And-Then-There-Were-None horror story.

I was gripped throughout. Caleb has courage – it wouldn't be possible to have survived on Ceti this long without it – but he knows his shortcomings, and he is terribly afraid. His brother vanished on a similar mission, and Caleb is desperate not to become another lost son for his mother to grieve. That makes him cautious to begin with, and the reader can sympathise. The terror only increases as they get closer to Eden, and there are plenty of obstacles, inanimate and living, that threaten to stop them dead. But Caleb's is a classic Hero's Journey, and when things get critically worse, he knows he has to find it in himself to save what's left of their party.

The characters can't help but be sympathetic, given what they're up against – and what they're fighting for, which is the highest possible stakes. They're all individuals, vividly drawn, and you root for every one, from the gruff and competent General Carthage to the eager but nervous naturalist Sara Arnson. You want them all to get out alive. You know perfectly well that won't happen.

D.W. Vogel puts a great deal of care into the technical, natural and scientific detail; the Tau Ceti e ecosystem makes sense, and so does the history of humanity's remnants. There are no laser guns for fighting off alien creatures; humanity didn't have time to invent them. This is a down-and-dirty, desperate fight for survival against impossible odds; The Walking Dead, but with dinosaurs.

The story ends not on a frustrating cliffhanger, but with a development that the reader desperately wants to follow through to its consequences. I'm on tenterhooks for the next instalment.


(currently available only as Kindle edition in the UK)

Horizon Alpha: Predators of Eden by D.W. Vogel; Future House Publishing £2.04

www.gillianphilip.com






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BROKEN SKY by Lee Weatherly: reviewed by Gillian Philip

"Everyone has to believe in something," says Amity Vancour's little brother, Hal. He means, of course, that people need to believe; but as it turns out, an awful lot of people love to believe in something. What Hal has not yet seen, at the quarter-point in this chilling novel, is a population persuaded with alarming ease to believe willingly, gladly, joyfully in something entirely irrational. 

I say 'chilling', but L.A. Weatherly's Broken Sky is more of a spine-freeze. Following the Cataclysm – a nuclear conflagration a couple of thousand years ago – the world has essentially been rebooted. Amity Vancour lives in an era that is more or less the 1940s, but second-time-around. And this time, humanity seems to have learned its lesson. 

Wars have happened in this universe – it's what people do – but Amity's own grandmother Louise, who lived through an appalling one, was instrumental in putting an end to them forever. The world is now overseen by the World for Peace, an international organisation that prioritises and ranks inter-state conflicts, then resolves them. The instruments of this admirable policy are the Peacefighters, a noble force who fight for their countries' rights against one another, at great personal risk but with none to civilians or large armies. For this service, Peacefighters are idolised by a grateful population – and fully trusted. Their thrilling Firedove [Spitfire] duels take place in the skies above the WfP complex, neutral territory in the Western Seaboard where the pilots of all nations socialise (when they're not engaged in aerial combat with one another). This world is not utopia, but it feels like the best version of humanity, and the Peacefighters are at its heart.

Enter John Gunnison, the demagogue who rules the neighbouring Central States – and who eyes the Western Seaboard with avarice. The Peacefights have been going his way lately, so Amity is thrilled and proud when her win in a duel retains the Western Seaboard's oil rights for five years. When that result is overturned for reasons she doesn't understand, the first doubts creep in – and when pilots begin to die in straightforward fights, things quickly get a lot more sinister.

Gunnison is a tremendous and shockingly believable villain. When we finally meet him, through Weatherly's secondary character Kay, his charisma shines, and it's clear how he has reached the pinnacle of power. His genius has been to manipulate the population with astrology; his strength comes from his genuine, fanatical belief. Astrological charts are cast for every citizen of the Central States; a Discordant outcome results in correction camps, torture and death. And while Gunnison's belief is sincere, those around him survive by knowing just how to manipulate a chart to make him happy. Kay prides herself on knowing how to read people; resourceful and ruthless, she is determined to reach his inner circle and stay alive.

Broken Sky begins with Amity on the run, alone and desperate and terrified for the life of her lover and childhood friend, Collie. From this heart-in-mouth flash-forward, Weatherly takes us back to Amity's previous golden existence as a respected Peacefighter, and the great mystery begins: how did she get from there to here? The story rarely lets up the tension, and when it does it's only for touching interludes of love and family life. Amity is a splendid protagonist, courageous, compassionate and able; and we fall in love with Collie almost as thoroughly as she does. But don't let me give the impression there's sentimentality in the romance; Peacefighters can't afford it. These are tough, passionate, honest warriors and their relationship feels real. 

What also feels very real is the world they live in. I felt sorriest for a character we never meet: President Lopez of the Western Seaboard, a politician doing his best for a nation that is increasingly unhappy and deprived as the Peacefights go against them. The people of the WS gaze with envy at the prosperous Central States and its strong, charismatic leader, and they begin to wonder if astrology can do the same wonders for them. They don't know – or don't want to know – about the Discordants and their fate. 

One of the creepiest aspects of the novel is the Astrology shops that begin to pop up with increasing frequency in the Western Seaboard; everyone has to believe in something. Astrology might seem like a stretch as a way to hypnotise a population; but Weatherly makes it an entirely believable phenomenon. And why not? These are not the first nations to fall wholesale for the joyfully bombastic rallies of a demagogue. Soon everyone's wearing their star sign on their lapel; after all, it's just a brooch, just a bit of fun. It's not as if it'll ever be obligatory... but what if Gunnison's right? What if the Discordants are somehow responsible for everyone's problems? Harmony is a benevolent ideal, isn't it? Perhaps a truly perfect world is within reach if Discordant elements can be neutralised.  

Lee Weatherly does a magnificent job of examining the good intentions of humanity, and the fragility of those ideals when put into practice. Good people succumb to temptation; good people begin to think about ends, and the means they are willing to tolerate in their pursuit. Good people decide to believe in bad people, and it's never going to end well.

Action, romance, heartbreak, betrayal, agonising guilt and heart-stopping tension: Broken Sky has it all. Oh, and fascinatingly detailed Spitfire dogfights. And delightful future-historical period detail. And TWISTS; dear Lord, the twists. And by the way, it's more than suitable for fully-grown adults as well as young ones. 

I should stop before I gush any more about this tremendous book (the first in a trilogy), but I'll leave you with a link to Lee Weatherly's Broken Sky Pinterest board (I was going to steal some illustrations from it, but the choice is too difficult). And besides, I found this shot of Ms Weatherly in a Spitfire: 

BROKEN SKY by Lee Weatherly; Usborne, £8.99

Broken Sky on Pinterest

www.gillianphilip.com 

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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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VERDIGRIS DEEP by Frances Hardinge: reviewed by Gillian Philip

So Frances Hardinge has the coolest style, especially when it comes to hats and gorgeous long coats. I was at the Fantasy WorldCon in Brighton last year when I met her. The convention happened to take place over the Halloween weekend, and Frances was laughing when she turned up one evening, because someone on the street had congratulated her on her Halloween costume. When she wasn't actually wearing one.

Hmm. I don't know; I think there's some kind of sorcery on the simmer here. Verdigris Deep was her second novel, and I picked it almost at random from her Amazon page because I was intrigued by the blurb: One evening, Ryan and his friends steal some coins from a well... Then the well witch appears, with her fountains for eyes and gargled demands. From now on the children must serve her – and the wishes rotting at the bottom of her well.

If you think it sounds as much like horror as fantasy, you'd be right, and yet there are moments of sinister comedy. Who'd have thought shopping trolleys could be sentient creatures of dread and terror? I was completely convinced, and I'll never pass the Tesco trolley stacks again without looking at them askance and wondering if they're watching me.

The witch at the bottom of the well is herself an extraordinary creation, seen initially in Ryan's visions after the three children steal her coins to pay for bus fare. She is introduced stealthily but horrifically: via Ryan's reflection in his own bathroom mirror, or in the eyes of a smiling model on an advertising hoarding. When the witch's true nature is at last revealed, there's something tragic about it despite the horror. She's doing what she was always meant to do, after all; but three twenty-first century children can't possibly have known just how deep a simple wish can go.

Ryan is the terrified, ultimately brave young hero, but his friends Josh and Chelle are if anything even more complex and engaging. All of them go through more changes than the reader expects, and they do so through challenges that are far deeper, darker and more twisted than they (or the reader) could foresee. Their happy expectations of being wish-granting Angels are gradually destroyed by the true natures of the wishes and the people who make them – and, of course, their own. Their peril lies as much within themselves as in the supernatural forces around them.

I never felt confident of a fully happy ending, and I feared most of all for Josh, who begins the story as the arrogant, charismatic leader of their small gang but falls apart, morally and psychologically, with every chapter. That genuine uncertainty is not too common in children's fiction, and it kept me reading into the small hours. (And no, I'm not going to tell you.)

It's a dark, intricate tale of fantastical but convincing danger, and it's written with stylish beauty, too. It's mysterious magic, is what it is.


Verdigris Deep by Frances Hardinge (Macmillan Children's Books, 2007), £6.99

www.gillianphilip.com




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SALVAGE by Keren David; reviewed by Gillian Philip

Salvage comes with an alarming tagline: Not everything that’s broken can be mended. Maybe that’s what gave me a mounting sense of dread as the paths of Cass and Aidan and their bewilderingly extended families converged. Not that the tagline is the only arresting thing on the very striking cover: there’s the tattoo on the back of Aidan’s neck, the single word Hope. It’s an ineradicable symbol that begins, at one point in the story, to look like a terrible joke.

Cass and Aidan are sister and brother, separated not at birth but when they were four and six respectively. She has no memory of her birth family; he remembers too much. They’ve had upbringings as different from one another as it’s possible to imagine: she’s now the high-achieving, Oxford-bound daughter of an MP, he’s the product of a care system that has failed him – and a product is what he seems to feel like, as much as the damaged goods on sale at the salvage shop where he works. By a chance of fate and Facebook the siblings find one another, twelve years after they were separated, and arrange a meeting that will have desperately frightening consequences for them and everyone around them.

Two voices tell the story, and they’re masterfully done. Aidan is one of those characters who could so easily lose the reader’s sympathy, but Keren David has previous when it comes to damaged young men (see When I Was Joe and its sequels) and she unfolds Aidan’s complex, terrible story with subtlety and grace. She has said in this interview that she found Cass harder to write, because the girl has so little self-awareness. Is there anything more frustrating than a character so pathologically self-contained she won’t even talk to her author? (I speak from some experience, *cough*.) Well, however David managed it in the end, it works beautifully. Cass might do her damnedest to alienate the reader, but in the end she’s too human to succeed. By the halfway point I wanted the best of everything for them both, and there are no guarantees they’ll get it.

It’s not unknown for nuanced main characters to be let down by a touch of cardboard in the supporting cast. No worries here. It’s been a long time since I’ve read a book where I can picture the characters so clearly, and hear their voices. For me that doesn’t come with physical description, but by that mystical process where they’re just there, suddenly, in the movie in your head. I’d single out Will and Ben as particular delights; Will’s relationship with Cass is lovely. (Cass’s father, by the way, looks like Rupert Graves. Take my word for it.) I confess, I had a tremor of doubt in the opening pages, which bring us a situation that’s almost a cliche of our times. Uh-oh, I thought: plot thread, please don’t play out like I fear you will … Oh, silly me. I shouldn’t have worried. Of course Keren David doesn’t develop a cliched situation in a cliched way.

Not everything that’s broken can be mended. True. But I’m not going to give the slightest spoilers about what does and doesn’t get fixed in this story. If you want to know – and you will – go on, read it. 

SALVAGE by Keren David: published by Atom Books

www.gillianphilip.com

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Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

Reviewed by Jackie Marchant

It’s the Second World War and a young SOE agent is about to make a written confession to the Gestapo, because she can’t bear the thought of another interrogation by SS-Hauptsturmfurher von Linden.  She has two weeks and then they will shoot her, but that is preferable to her fate if she does not confess.  She calls herself a coward.

But read on and you will see that she is anything but.  She is brave and clever in equal measure, running rings round her captors despite her predicament.  She uses her long confession as a tribute to her best friend Maddie, who lost her life trying to land the plane that secretly brought her to France.   At the same time, she manages to riddle her confession with code that will ensure that her mission will not fail.  She even works out a way to get her notes out there.

This book is about a strong female friendship, it is about plucky young women and their determined war effort and it is about triumph in the most difficult of circumstances.  It is both happy and sad,  with two strong main characters that have you cheering and crying in equal measure.  The scenes of cruelty at the hands of the Gestapo are handled with such sensitivity that the full horror comes over without the need for any graphic detail.  The relationship between Linden and Verity is so well drawn as Verity manages to creep under his skin and turn the tables on him, that you almost feel sorry for him.  Almost.   

Then there is betrayal, danger and plenty of action, as the resistance try and carry out their task without their key player.   All this makes Code Name Verity a book that will engage right from start to finish, quite deservedly earning its place on the Carnegie shortlist.   

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Vampire Dawn by Anne Rooney: reviewed by Gillian Philip

Real Vampires - as the ageless Spike would tell you in many a fetching internet meme - Don't Sparkle. Anne Rooney's don't, that's for sure. Nor do they disappoint.

icanhascheezburger.com

The Vampire Dawn saga is a cleverly constructed series of short novels in the hi-lo style, ideal for the reluctant reader but no small fun for the enthusiastic one, either. The stories are compact and bijou - ideal for devouring on a bus journey to school, say - but packed with incident and character, not to mention blood and guts. If you know a teen or a slightly-pre-teen who isn't particularly keen on romance but likes a decent bloodsucker, point them in the direction of Vampire Dawn.

The books are readable in any order, but it would undoubtedly help to start with Die Now Or Live Forever. The whole story begins here - in the fine tradition of horror movies, with a group of mildly bickering friends on a hike in the woods. In this case it's the Hungarian woods, which seem to be populated by especially big and Hungary mosquitoes (boom boom).

This is the lonely spot where Juliette, Omar, Finn, Ruby and Alistair stumble across a dead body that doesn't stay dead for long. They also run into the (temporary) murderer: a downright panicky Australian called Ava, who doesn't understand why she's just had to stick a tent peg through the heart of her beloved boyfriend.

And in the morning the appeal of sandwiches and ginger beer seems mysteriously to fade, and the group begins to look peckishly upon the bewildered Ava...

knowyourmeme.com

The other books in the Vampire Dawn series focus on each individual member of the group, and what happens to them in the aftermath of their ill-fated camping trip: Juliette (Drop Dead, Gorgeous), Finn (Life Sucks), Omar (Every Drop Of Your Blood), Alistair and Ruby (Dead On Arrival) and Ava herself (In Cold Blood). Pretty much at random I chose Ava's story: some time after the events of Die Now Or Live Forever, the bewildered Australian girl is stumbling around Kosovo in a borrowed fur coat, with no memory of how she got there. All she knows is that she's hungry, and that she doesn't feel as jittery around a creepy and dilapidated circus as she normally would. In fact it could be a source of raw meat of several kinds...

Given the tightly restricted word count of each book (around 6,000?), the various characters and their relationships are briskly and efficiently drawn. Alistair, my particular favourite, is an OCD boy who likes to count things.

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For the teen who's especially keen on traditional vampires, there's even a guide book: Bloodsucking For Beginners. Like the mysterious Ignace, a handsome stranger who seems to have strolled into the group's lives out of a 1930s black-and-white horror movie, it's full of advice for perplexed immortal newbies...

These books are terrific fun, and they're a great, snappy read. I adore the device of giving a book to every character, and Anne Rooney (who apparently doesn't eat meat in case she gets too much of a taste for blood) has clearly had a lot of fun with the genre's tropes and traditions. Yet she never loses respect for the primal, terrifying ferocity of vampires. There's romance and teen angst here, and the delights and agonies of friendship, but there's plenty of blood too - just as there should be.

I can't imagine many teens who wouldn't love a brief trip to the world of Vampire Dawn. I had a great time. (Also, the covers are fabulous.)


Die Now Or Live Forever
Dead on Arrival
Life Sucks
Every Drop Of Your Blood
Drop Dead, Gorgeous
In Cold Blood
Bloodsucking For Beginners

By Anne Rooney; published by Ransom Publishing, April 2012

I mean, that guy's scary. He just IS.

www. gillianphilip.com

growingguides.com

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DON'T JUDGE ME by Linda Strachan, Reviewed by Penny Dolan.

This novel's stunning cover blazes with flames, reminding us that arson is, in writing terms, already an interesting focus for a book for older teens and young adult readers. 

However, in “Don’t Judge Me” award-winning author Linda Strachan has also created a very clever novel. We are offered four – or maybe five – protagonists, each of whom could have set the fire, but the plot takes one twist after another, making the reader suspend judgement.

The book is written in a simple style and the different viewpoints are clearly indicated so the novel feels accessible for most teen readers.   

Chapter by interwoven chapter, a loose gang of four teenage friends reveal more about themselves, their backgrounds and their conflicts..

The novel begins strongly, with stroppy, half-drunk Suzie, a rebel in foster care, catching a baby tumbling from one of the burning flats on the estate. Another fire blazes in the home of Jenna and her loving Indian family.  Unlike Suzie, Jenna gets almost everything she wants - except the freedom to be an individual. Now, forced to move into her aunty’s home, Jenna will be even more closely watched. And was the fire a racist attack?  Jenna and her family face troubling threats.

The pair of boys are Malky and Jack. Troubled Malky is someone Suzie has known since they were in care together, but now he brings his own problems and solutions to the mix. Jack, Malky’s friend, seems to be the most stable of the group – but is he? Jack lives with his frail grandmother. His journalist mother is more interested in her assignments abroad than in her own son and he is full of hidden anger and bitterness.

A local police officer, DI Larkin,  has the task of trying to untangle the case and the conflicting clues - as well as working out what the anonymous witness saw on that night when the fire took hold – and how her terrified account fits in with the statements on his desk.

At first, the four teenage friends seem to have little in common beyond their love of hanging about together. They are full of the usual teenage jealousies, insecurities and bravado. They get annoyed by each other and indulge in tantrums and games, especially games that can go wrong. Nevertheless,during the novel, the experiences they share force them to decide on where their loyalties lie and the importance of truth. 

Meanwhile, the reader is forced to wait and suspend judgement until they have heard each part of the story in full.

As author Keith Gray says, “Don’t Judge Me” is “a tricksy whodunit” and a great contemporary read for teenagers.

Penny Dolan.

Don't Judge Me was published in 2012 by Strident Publishing.

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Dark Matter by Michelle Paver: Review by John Dougherty

Michelle Paver is best known as the author of the hugely successful Chronicles of Ancient Darkness series; but in Dark Matter she takes the darkness to a deeper level - one which, as she says in the back-of-the-book-interview, would be too much for a children’s novel.

 

The year is 1937, and Jack Miller, an impoverished young physics graduate and export clerk, accepts the position of wireless operator with a geological and meteorological expedition to an island off the north coast of Norway. 

Socially isolated at home and very much aware of the class divide that separates him from the other members of the team, Jack at first revels in the stark beauty of the Arctic. 

The expedition, however, is dogged by bad luck, and circumstances eventually conspire to leave him on his own in the darkness of the months-long Arctic night. But although left by himself, Jack is not entirely alone...

Dark Matter is in many ways a good old-fashioned ghost story; but what sets it apart is the ingenious setting. Alongside the sense of period, Paver conjures up the bleakness of the Arctic and the darkness of its winter quite wonderfully, and with them a genuine sense of Jack’s fear. The development of Jack’s character - his own thawing-out and the slow divesting of his habits of solitude - are deftly handled, and make his eventual isolation and the events that follow all the more harrowing.

This is not one to read by yourself on a long winter’s night unless you really enjoy being scared; but it is a great book, and one that is as beautifully written as it is suspenseful. Recommended for all but the faint-hearted.

 John Dougherty

www.visitingauthor.com

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THE DAMAGE DONE by Linda Newbery. Reviewed by Ann Turnbull

One of the pleasures of train travel is the opportunity to read for long stretches of time.  I recently took my Kindle on a long journey and read this book - one that I'd missed when it was first published in 2001.

I always enjoy Linda Newbery's novels, and this is now one of my favourites.  Although written for teenagers, it's likely to appeal just as much to adults.

Seventeen-year-old Kirsty suffers from night terrors and a fear of crowded places.  She tells lies to her friends and family, inventing imaginary boyfriends and finding excuses for being unable to go out.  Her mother has remarried; her father, a writer, is interested only in his work; and her beloved older brother Jay has gone to America.  Kirsty has failed her exams and refuses to return to studying, despite pressure from her mother.  She prefers to be involved in household tasks and caring for horses.  But the responsibility of running the family home and livery business weighs heavily on her - especially when local people hear of a spate of vicious attacks on horses and the police are known to be looking for suspects.

Kirsty meets Dally, a mysterious and offhand young man employed nearby as a gardener.  Like her, he clearly has family problems, though he will tell her nothing about himself.  She is drawn to him - but can she trust him?

Linda Newbery's writing has a measured quality, and yet she always maintains tension.  Her story unfolds at its own pace, and there is a sense of the seasons, of trees, water and weather, and of the beauty and grace of horses and their natural lives.  Several threads of mystery run through this book, and secrets reveal themselves gradually.  Kirsty makes mistakes, but in the end she comes to a better understanding of herself and others.

This is a story that makes a plea for not forcing either animals or people to conform, but allowing them to take their own way.  I found it a compelling read.

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DREAMS by Daniela Sacerdoti; reviewed by Gillian Philip

First, a declaration of interest: I got to know Daniela Sacerdoti (@danisacerdoti), as I have so many other good friends, on Twitter. She was kind enough to send me a copy of her adult novel WATCH OVER ME, which as an IVF veteran enthralled me while touching all kinds of chords, including umbilical ones (forgive the pun. Oh all right, don't).

So I was delighted and intrigued to hear that Daniela's next novel with Black and White Publishing was to be a YA paranormal thriller, DREAMS - the first in a trilogy about the enticingly named Sarah Midnight. Sarah, as it happens, is on Twitter too (@sarahmmidnight) - another of these wretched characters who slip the authorial leash to to dabble in social networking. (I can't imagine how any author could so ineptly lose editorial control over their own creations - right, @sethmacgregor?)

Sarah is a character who grows on you like a vine - slowly at first, with her understandable resentment at her deceased parents, who were so busy battling demons they forgot to teach her either about life, or about avoiding death. So nervous and scared and grief-stricken at the beginning of the book, she's outrageously OCD - I wish Sarah was in charge of cleaning my house - she has by the final chapter emerged from her self-imposed chrysalis a cold and violently determined butterfly. The reasons for her growth - which she has resisted for so long - I'm certainly not going to tell you. That would be Spoilers. But by the book's end, that creeping vine has wrapped itself round your throat, and you'll be as eager as I am for the sequels.

There's a host of marvellous supporting characters, from the mysterious Leaf - whose motives and loyalties remain shifting and nebulous even at the end of this book - to the mesmerising Harry, who isn't Harry at all. (Bear with me - and read the book, because I'm not going to explain myself here.)

As for the villains - well, it's always difficult to find monsters who are viler and more frightening with each paranormal book that's published. Trust me, the demons Sarah has to fight do not disappoint - you'll be anxiously watching your step the next time you walk on the soft peaty earth of a moor.

DREAMS is Waterstones' Book of the Month for May, as well as Book of the Month for the Scottish Book Trust. It's officially launched on 12th May at Waterstones Argyle Street, Glasgow - and I'll be there, looking nervously over my shoulder at the bookshelf shadows. And I really, really want a poster of that stunning cover...

DREAMS by Daniela Sacerdoti. Published by Black & White Publishing

www.gillianphilip.com
www.facebook.com/gillianphilipauthor






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Dead Boy Talking by Linda Strachan. Reviewed by Emma Barnes

A boy is dying. He has been stabbed. He is lying, abandoned, in a pool of his own blood, knowing that his life is trickling away.

This is the arresting start to Dead Boy Talking. It’s a bold and brave premise for a book. Certainly it grabs the reader’s attention in a very shocking way. But the end looks inevitable. How can the writer maintain suspense and create surprise, and maintain a deep interest in the characters, in the face of such a grim beginning – a beginning that seems to go only in one direction?

All I can say is Linda Strachan pulls it off. The writing is powerful and visceral and does not dodge the bleak present.

"I start to laugh but my breath vanishes in an icy purple stripe of pain. I grab at the pain to make it stop and stare in disbelief at my hand, a thick, sticky glove of blood."

Yet by going backwards, and delving into the story of how Josh has ended up where he has – a story which contains a tragic accident and a family mystery – Strachan cleverly creates suspense, surprise and a real desire to find out what happens next.

Furthermore, she adeptly handles – and gets into the heads of – a large cast of characters. Josh, his loyal friend Danny, his ex-best friend Ranj – and Skye, the nerdish girl-next-door: all of them are more than they seem, all have their own stories. The online friendship of Josh and Skye, based around gaming and messaging, seemed to me authentic and particularly moving.

Of course, as a reader you are hoping all the time that Josh will pull through. At the same time, you know a fairytale ending would feel like a cop-out. I won’t give away what happens, I will only say it is satisfying and contains an element of hope.

A gritty tale for teenagers, with a very human heart.

Emma Barnes is the writer of very un-gritty books for the 7-12 age-groups. Her latest book, How (Not) To Make Bad Children Good, concerns a naughty child who is sent a suprising and unexpected "Guardian Agent".

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THE HENRY GAME; DELILAH AND THE DARK STUFF; MAD, BAD AND TOTALLY DANGEROUS by SUSAN DAVIS. Reviewed by Ann Turnbull

Susan Davis's three novels about teenagers Abbie and Lauren and their spooky adventures were first published in paperback and have now been reissued as e-books by Random House.  Abbie, the first-person narrator, is a typical teenager - anxious, jealous, occasionally bitchy, and always horribly embarrassed by her parents.  She is also fascinated by the occult and desperate to fall in love.

In the first book, THE HENRY GAME, Abbie, Lauren and their friend Marina use a home-made Ouija board to conjure up spirits and are haunted by the ghost of Henry VIII.  Henry lusts (though not explicitly, so adult guardians need have no fears) after all the girls, but especially the lovely Marina, who falls under his spell and ends up in real danger.  Meanwhile, Abbie is drawn to Marina's flashy, charming cousin, Nikos.  Henry is a superb creation who not only demands the girls' attention to his royal commands but will not allow any other admirers ("Master Nicolas is a foul churl," he remarks, via the Ouija board).

Perfectly paced and sparkling with wit, DELILAH AND THE DARK STUFF has mystery and an engaging new character in lonely, grungy Delilah with her dreadlocks, Doc Martens and knowledge of witchcraft.  Delilah's stepfather, 'the Loathsome Verne', is a manic Puritan who forces repressive energy-saving economies on his family and forbids almost all aspects of modern life.  But there is also a shadowy presence stalking the girls: Matthew Hopkins, Witch-Finder General.  The action moves from north London to the depths of Shropshire, where Hopkins' power increases.  It's far too funny to be truly frightening, but there is gruesome historical detail of how alleged witches used to be trussed and ducked.

MAD, BAD AND TOTALLY DANGEROUS - the last story in the series, and possibly the most scary - involves the ghosts of Lord Byron and his unhappy mistress Claire Clairmont.  Abbie and Lauren are roped in to help at the local poetry festival.  Abbie has bad vibes about this right from the start, and soon both girls realize that handsome poet Ron Lord is not what he seems.  But the other young helper, Ruby, refuses to believe that the man she's throwing herself at is a ghost.  All three girls are drawn into a nightmarish mix of past and present - with Byron's grand house and grounds providing the perfect gothic setting for the finale.

These books are clever, funny, with characters you'll care about, and just a dash of genuine creepiness.  Do try them!

Published as Kindles by RHCB Digital in 2011.
The Henry Game ISBN: 1446453626; Delilah and the Dark Stuff ISBN: 0552547948; Mad, Bad and Totally Dangerous ISBN: 1446453669.

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