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Tiger, Tiger by Lynne Reid Banks

We begin this tale set in an approximation of 3rd century AD Rome with the capture of two tiger cubs in India. The loss of their mother, and their experiences in the hold of a ship, are handled with appropriate distance: the tigers of course have no idea what is going on. Even younger readers however may well know already that this capture means the Colosseum and the ruthless circuses where gladiators, Christians, slaves, rebels and wild animals all go to fight and die.

We then meet the spirited princess Aurelia to whom one of the tiger cubs is destined. Together with the handsome slave Julius she works hard and the tiger, Boots, is tamed with clever handling and kindness. Boots' brother Brute is meanwhile tormented into aggression ready for the arena. The royal household is, like Rome, in Ceasar's thrall and as petty jealousies run through Aurelia's circle a trick is played that means Aurelia, Julius and the tigers must all learn to stand their ground.

For me the success of this book is the characterisation. Aurelia is simply a character that you want to spend time with, and who wins your sympathy in a world where, 'the only way we women can get through our lives honourably is with courage and resignation, both.' Aureila has courage in buckets, but has to learn resignation. The tigers are also beautifully portrayed, fearsome beasts who are not over-anthropomorphised.

After a slow start the plot becomes quite dramatic in the middle and later sections and, even as an adult, I couldn't quite see how Lynne Reid Banks was going to pull of an ending both believable and not too heart-breaking. The clever plotting  of this latter section is very neatly done.

Overall a good yarn with a strong female lead and great historical atmosphere. Much of the language is fairly simple but the odd challenging word (I had to look one up!), the historical setting and the complexity of the treatment of the themes of family, power, animals, belief, psychology, etc., all just about lift this into a more challenging read perhaps up to 12 year olds. After which it is an enjoyable read, no more.

Watch points:

Peril: from the start someone is in danger whether tiger or human. This builds into great focus with the gladiator fights, from which the reader is slightly removed as we don't even know their names, and then up to real terror for Aurelia and Julius by the end.

Death: again, there is lots of death. The tigers' mother is the first death which, whilst nothing compared to what happens later, may still upset more sensitive readers. The circus scenes are well handled: lots of death, both cruel and graphic, but viewed through the prism of the brave but sensitive Aurelia the reader learns that life is not fair but must still be faced. There is no glorifying of death in the arena: watching women faint and Aurelia's friend is physically sick.

Religion: Aurelia worships the Roman gods but starts to empathise with the Christians in the arena with their brave resignation. She questions the beliefs she has grown-up with and at one point smashes her Roman shrine and tries to make an offering to the Christian god, (all mixed up with her original beliefs in a very believable way) which is in part answered.

Relationships: Aurelia falls for the handsome slave and he for her, but their positions keep them apart. Aurelia at one point tells her mother she should 'withhold' herself from Caesar to influence his opinion. Roman children marry at 13.

Politics: there are lots of undercurrents about power and the nature of a good ruler. What is strength, what is mercy, and how to rule in front of a mob, or indeed a crouching tiger are all covered.

Anything else: the treatment of of the tigers, even the pet one, is as unpleasant as you would expected of the era. There are slaves whose treatment is likewise casually cruel.

Other reviews and useful sites:

The author's website page for Tiger, Tiger.

Kirkus review (which is much less positive than mine).

Middle Grade Ninja review.

King of Shadows by Susan Cooper

King of Shadows is a clever, sensitive novel by Susan Cooper. It begins with an unhappy American boy, Nat Field, being selected to join a troupe of actors who are heading to London to perform A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Globe. Whilst in London Nat starts to feel unwell and goes to bed. When he wakes up he is a new boy drafted into a company of players in Elizabethan London. Playing Puck in the modern Globe is nothing to acting alongside William Shakespeare. Shakespeare and Nat find themselves drawn to each other through a common bereavement: Shakespeare has lost his son, and Nat his father. Will Nat get stuck in Elizabethan England or face the even scarier prospect of going back to his own time and losing Shakespeare with all he means to him?

Not only does Susan Cooper have to pull off a convincing time-slip novel with strong Elizabethan detail, she has to cross pens with the greatest writer of them all and make this challenging charaterisation come alive. For a little while I thought she wasn't going to manage it. The Elizabethan setting was managed well (and grittily), and the little in-fights amongst the cast convincing enough, but how was she going to make Shakespeare live? Little by little Cooper spins a stronger and stronger fabric for her narrative. By focusing on him as much as bereaved father as "Great Writer" Will Shakespeare gradually convinces.

By the end I thought this a moving example of older children's fiction that works on many levels: a competent fantasy, a well executed piece of historical narrative, and increasingly elegant characterisation. It is a wonderful background novel to understanding Elizabethan theatre, the process of writing and putting on a play, and what Elizabethan audiences are like. It is also a great study of loss and bereavement. However A Midsummer Night's Dream is so crucial to the scenes between the actors, and so reflective of themes in the wider narrative, that a good understanding of the play is, I think, required, especially for a child to whom the whole concept of Shakepeare and his world may be new.

If you know a child who has read, or seen the play, or has read and discussed a modern re-telling, then this is a superb support for Shakespearian teaching. It is a lovely, moving book, but may be more enjoyed by adults than children.

Watch Points:

Death: Nat's parents have both died. His father, it emerges near the end, has killed himself and Nat was the first to find the body, "...there was blood on the floor, bright red, a pool of red blood, spreading ..." Nat's pain and loss are very real, and very subtly built up as the story goes on. Like most people damaged by bereavement Nat is functioning. Cooper shows what it costs Nat to seem "normal". The second loss, of Shakespeare when Nat returns to his own time, is used to explore the mechanism of bereavement. It is all beautifully done, and may help a bereaved child at the right point.

Peril: minor, linked to problems of going back in time, and to not understanding your world. There are also some political threats to Shakespeare and the players over the politics of Elizabethan England. The whole company is fearful at times.

Anything else: Elizabethan England is of necessity rather earthy. Not much worse than an episode of Horrible Histories though. There is discussion of the use of pig's blood as a prop and how "the groundlings are happy so long as they see it gush..", that sort of thing. Plus rather colourful discussions of bear baiting (a deliberately blinded bear, and someone's dog is disemboweled), which affects Nat terribly because he can't bear the sight of the pool of blood after his father's death.

Other reviews and useful websites:

Susan Cooper's own website is here. There is a recent interview with her at The Guardian here.

There is a New York Times review here.

There are a range of blog reviews available: Scholar's Blog, A Hoyden's Look at Literature, Miss Erin, Jen Robinson's Book Page, etc.

At the time of writing Sue at Green Meadow Books has a lovely copy of the first edition here.

The Edge of the Cloud by K.M. Peyton

The Edge of the Cloud by K.M. Peyton is the second book in the Flambards series. Though regarded as a series of pony stories The Edge of the Cloud is markedly different to the other three volumes as it has only one riding scene in it. What it is in fact is a wonderful historical novel with a little romance and a lot of flying, set just prior to WWI.

The previous novel, Flambards, ended with cousins Will and Christina eloping after the hunt ball and The Edge of the Cloud begins immediately, the same night, as they arrive in London at their aunt's house. Told from Christina's perspective the bulk of the book is really about Will and his attempts first to get a job with his beloved aircraft, then to fly again and to save the money to get his damaged leg fixed so it will bend into cockpits. When that small matter is resolved, Will wants to design and build his own plane.

Christina is on the sidelines for this but her own life is interesting too. Much to her aunt's dismay she decides to get a job and trains as a hotel receptionist. She does other 'fast' things such as staying all night at the airfield (as the only woman) to help with the planes. Though she rebels against her aunt's social conservatism she is still very much subordinate to Will who treats her very casually. She is, as she says, always second to his first love, flying.

The book is a very satisfying read. The general thrust of the plot is not particularly engrossing but there are plenty of exciting episodes. Peyton also shows just how well she can write. Her descriptions of these early experiments in flying are wonderful. Christina is terrified of flying but feels that she must always appear never to mind either Will's exploits, dangerous through they are, nor her own trips into the sky. Crossing the channel was the ultimate test of her nerve:

The sea, as they came inevitably closer, resolved itself into waves and troughs. The metallic similes were lost in the reality of the stuff. There was nothing fanciful  in its nature at close quarters. Christina looked over the side, down over the wings, and saw the restless, desultory heaving of the grey waves. There was no comfort there; they were heedless of her feelings, grey vultures slip-slapping in an endless, pointless dance up and down the Channel. She looked at the back of Will's head, and pictured him disappearing under the grey waves, and the hot tears welled up inside her goggles so that she could no longer see. Better not to see, she thought, sniffing numbly, better never to think ... 'Dear Aunt Grace, We are over the sea ... Dear Aunt Grace, The sea is over us ...'

Will being a man of few words when it comes to their relationship, the oil-splattered scrap of paper saying, 'I love you', which comes during the above flight is the nearest Christina gets to romance.

In the end, I think this has become my favourite of the series, something which I wasn't anticipating. I like the development of their relationship, which whilst not very egalitarian, is also quite real. I also like the group of friends that they gather round them: gentle pilot Sandy and the exciting Dorothy.

Watch points:

Peril: there are lots of heart in mouth moments with the flying. Especially when they take up stunt and exhibition flying. I suspect these scare adults (with a more advanced sense of anticipation) than they do children however!

Death: pilots die flying these early planes. One significant character dies and characters (one nice, one nasty) from the previous book also die. The reactions to death are very well done: the shock and horror at an accident; the casual indifference to the death of a brutal and bullying parent. They may require some talking through, especially with the young end of our age group.

Relationships: Will is more likely to touch his plane than Christina, but there are discussions of what it is Christina may or may not do (like stay out all night at the airfield), of what is 'proper', which requires a bit of understanding of the facts of life, and some understanding of the social conservatism before the war.

Overall: a lovely historical novel. Plenty of excitement, but rather episodically so. Some of the other books in the series, especially the last one Flambards Divided, have some significantly more adult themes, so you might need to bear that in mind when introducing younger readers to this book.

Other reviews and useful sites:

You can read my review of the first novel Flambards here.

K. M. Peyton has her own website and there is a nice piece on her in The Guardian.

There is an excellent review of Flambards on academic Rohan Maitzen's site here, and one of the Flambards series on the blog  A Thing With Feathers.

I bought my copies of the quartet from the lovely Jane of Jane Badger Books who is a national treasure when it comes to pony books. Jane's K.M. Peyton page is here. Jane has a history of the English pony story coming out this month, Heroines on Horseback.

A TV adaption was made of the first three books and is available on DVD

Flambards by K.M. Peyton

Flambards by K.M. Peyton is the engaging first volume of a historical trilogy that belatedly turned into a quartet over a decade later. This first book is definitely a pony book but later books are more varied.

It is 1908 and Christina, an orphan, is 12 and being sent to live with Uncle Russell. She has been moved between relatives all her life and this is nothing new. Uncle Russell has two teenage sons and Christina believes that she is intended to marry the older one so the money she will eventually inherit will save Flambards, the crumbling family pile, from further deterioration.

Flambards is a depressing house ruled over by the tyrannical Uncle Russell who is severely disabled from a hunting field accident. His elder son Mark is also horse mad but the young boy Will is a totally different character. When we first meet Will he is falling off a horse to be carried badly broken from the hunting field and for much of the first part of the book he is in bed.

Christina is told she must learn to ride and is taught by the patient groom Dick. Mark nearly gets her killed by putting her on an unsuitable horse too early (an event he treats as a joke) and she is saved by the quick thinking of Dick. Depsite this she loves riding and eventually she too is a 'hunting Russell'.

Uncle Russell lives for tales of the chase and won't tolerate non-riders. Will is terrified of horses and Christina catches him trying to walk on his broken leg so it will set badly and he won't have to ride. Christina watches the family in a slightly detached way as careless joking Mark and serious Will deal with their father. Russell is a brute and bully and there are some well written and compellingly unpleasant family scenes.

Gradually Christina is drawn into the family as the years pass. She loves the horses and gets on with Mark in a love-hate sort of way. Unloved kindly Will, with his obsession with planes, she admires and feels sorry for. There is very much a sense of distance between  family and servants which Peyton, writing in the egalitarian 60s, starts to undermine through Christina. She can't see the patient and skillful groom Dick as just a servant and enrolls him in saving her pony Sweetbriar from being shot. She, Dick and Will pay heavily for this in one of the most unpleasant of Uncle Russell's many gritty moments. Dick is sacked, Will is given a horrific flogging, and Christina is  hit in the face with a crutch.

The book is driven by the hunting season and family relationships and so character is all. Peyton's mastery here is clear, especially in delineating two so different brothers, and two very different kinds of bravery alongside a third variation of masculinity in the steadfast Dick. By the end of the book the hunt ball is in full swing and Christina elopes with one of the three young men in her life. Whilst I can't see modern 12 year olds becoming Team Mark, Team Will or Team Dick in quite the same way as Twihards do, this book has much of the same appeal - with added horses!

I enjoyed the whole series but my favourite books are this one and the utterly brilliant second one The Edge of the Cloud which deserves a review of its own. Be warned that the last volume, Flambards Divided, whilst not grossly explicit, does deal with some very adult themes.

Watch Points:

Peril: hunting has lots of peril and there are some sickening accidents. Not a book for the queasy. Christina is often nervous but never exactly frightened, so this keeps the feeling of danger at one remove.

Violence: there is Uncle Russell's temper and the thrashings. Dick beats Mark to a pulp for getting his sister Violet pregnant.

Relationships:  there are simmering feelings throughout the book. Christina clearly does not know the facts of life and raises questions others feel awkward answering. Violet the maid becomes pregnant by Mark and Christina is baffled. Will and the housekeeper won't explain the hows and whys.

Death: animals, especially foxes, die. Dick's mother dies but this is touched on only briefly.

Anything else: hunting and lots of it. This mainly from the perspective of the riding experience but there is 'blooding'. The riding descriptions are wonderful but the hunting won't appeal to everyone. The accidents and fights: there are a lot of broken bones and bloody noses and Will trying to walk on his broken leg in a cold sweat with his face 'greenish' from the pain is a real 'eugh' moment. Not a book for anyone who feels faint at medical things.

Overall: I thoroughly enjoyed all aspects of the book: the horses, the characters, the historical elements. Not much happens plot wise, but it has much to appeal to the older children in our age group who respond to character driven fiction.

Other reviews and useful sites:

You can read my review of the second volume in the series, The Edge of the Cloud, here.

K. M. Peyton has her own website and there is a nice piece on her in The Guardian.

There is an excellent review of Flambards on academic Rohan Maitzen's site here, and one of the Flambards series on the blog  A Thing With Feathers. There is also an interesting blog piece comparing Flambards with The Hunger Games: strong outdoorsy women in a man's world, time of war, etc.

I bought my copies of the quartet from the lovely Jane of Jane Badger Books who is a national treasure when it comes to pony books. Jane's KM Peyton page is here. Jane has a history of the English pony story coming out next month, Heroines on Horseback.

A TV adaption was made of the first three books and is available on DVD .

Charlotte Sometimes by Penelope Farmer

Charlotte Sometimes by Penelope Farmer is on the shortlist for one of the best loved books of my childhood. The other main contender is Stars of Fortune by Cynthia Harnett. Whilst I reviewed Swallows and Amazons as a newcomer, a first time adult reader, here I find it hard to lose my twelve year old self who just wants to rave about it.

Published in 1969 and set a little before (if the internal ages of characters in the book are to work), the story is a wonderful fantasy, a great boarding school story, and a time slip novel with a lovely long historical section. Charlotte is on her first night at boarding school and this is strange enough but when she wakes the following day she appears to have gone back in time to WWI and everyone assumes she is someone called Clare, even Clare's little sister Emily. The day after that she is back in her own time but no-one has noticed she was missing. She realises Clare had been taking her place. For many days Charlotte and Clare swap, and swap about again, causing chaos in both their lives as they try to keep up the pretence, for fear that no-one would believe their story. Then, one day whilst Charlotte is in Clare's time (and vice versa) Charlotte or 'Clare' and Emily are moved out of the school to live with a local family, and Charlottte and Clare are both trapped in the wrong eras.

 The long central section  when the girls are trapped has subtle and sensitive characterisation of Charlotte (trying to be Clare) and a wonderful creation in Clare's little sister Emily. The evocation of WWI England is sharp, clear, and not a little scary. And despite all its sophisticated trappings, this book succeeds on the simplest and most basic level: you soooo want to know what happens to the girls.

The premise of this plot fascinated me as a child. I was musing on identity and what I now know to be the philosophy of the self. If I managed that all by myself, just think where you could take a bookgroup considering the philosophy behind this novel! Similarly the use of time and narrative structure make for interesting analysis. The are many ways in which the substance of this novel could be used to stretch bright children,  whilst its surface story will entertain.

For this review I have re-read the book and it has been my third re-read as an adult. It has lost none of its considerable charm. I am also delighted to say that my bookgroup (Y5 and Y6, or 9-11 year olds, both boys and girls) all loved the book too. They all said that they might have passed it by in a shop or library, but that they were so glad they'd read it, making it one those I am so glad I dangled in front of them. The boys all said that it was 'no way' just a girls' book, that it was a 'book for anyone'.

As an interesting aside Robert Smith, the lead singer  of The Cure, also loves this book and The Cure released it as a single with a video. See below for links.

Watch points:

Peril: of the fantasy kind, such as will Charlotte and Clare get stuck in the wrong eras. The children in WWI also fear for relatives who are fighting, but this is peril at one remove.

Death: the war brings death. Charlotte and Emily back in 1918 live in a house mourning a soldier. One of the girls loses a father. A teacher loses a fiancé. Shortly after she gets back to her own time Charlotte hears with sadness of the early death of someone from Spanish flu back in 1918.

There is no romance,  nor any violence beyond the shadow of the war.

Anything else: there's a seance.

Overall: not only my personal favourite, but also the most successful book I used with my bookclub.

Other reviews and useful sites:

The video for Charlotte Sometimes by The Cure can be seen here (interestingly both the 1950s and the WWI characters seem to be working 80s hairstyles!).

Penelope Farmer's blog is here and you can read her story of meeting Robert Smith, and hearing Charlotte Sometimes performed live, in two parts here and here, and see her photographs of her old school on which she based the school in the book here.

There is a review on Typographical Era and there is an interesting chat on the Enid Blyton society Forum about the book and what else to read if you like Charlotte Sometimes.

Edited to add: Vintage Children's Classics are bringing out a new edition of Charlotte Sometimes in the autumn which will include a range of additional material currently planned to include: a Who’s Who of the characters, a child-friendly author biography, a quiz, further information about WWI and Britain during the war, some ideas to think about, an interview with Penelope Farmer, recommendations for further reading etc. I will add a link to the page on Vintage's website when they have one, in the meantime, the main page for Vintage Children's Classics is here.

 

Hero on a Bicycle by Shirley Hughes

Hero on a Bicycle by Shirley Hughes is, unbelievably, Hughes' first novel. Best known for her books for younger children including Alfie and Dogger, Hughes is tackling a YA novel here with great success.

Paolo is thirteen years old and living in German occupied Italy at the end of WWII. His mother Rosemary is English and his Italian father is in hiding with the partisans. His older sister Constanza appears bored and interested only in teenage girl things.

The story that spins out from these characters has a centrifugal force of its own: childhood rebellions, teenage stubbornness, the invincibility of youth and attractions of romance exacerbate the central event (hiding of two airmen) into something far bigger than any of the participants could have imagined. The era was perilous and it would be so easy to makes this book too frightening but Hughes contains the elements within the YA frame whilst making it still seem so very real. The adults are suitably flawed as desperate frightened adults are in war-time and unusually for a children's book we get much of the point of view of the mother including a  sense of her desperate loneliness as she tries to handle the ever increasing danger alone and without her husband. A happy, loving marriage is beautifully implied.

I couldn't put this one down!

Watch points:

Peril: constant. The threat of death or capture and tortures un-named is ever present. To be honest the threat is probably worse for an adult reader as we know the sort of things that might entail whereas a child might not. But still, to watch a child fearful for their mother is hard. I think Hughes' use of the mother's point of view is so effective here. We see she is scared too, but more for her children than herself, and that is somehow reasuring as it keeps the focus of fear moving between the characters and slightly dissipating as it goes. the mother's mind often drifts back to London and her own mother and the bombing there, again dissipating the fear across the continent. It is still not for the super sensitive though.

Death: this a war book and there are bombings and executions and surprise attacks. Exactly who dies and when is not always clear. Presumed dead characters pop up later. Paolo's beloved elderly dog is shot by the Gestapo. A German soldier whom the family know dies unpleasantly in front of Constanza.

Violence: see death and peril above.

Relationships: this is fairly subtle and not the main focus of the book. At the start there are mainly looks and glances between Constanza and some of the soldiers and airmen, as it progresses and the danger increases there is more in the way of kisses and declarations. All the love is sanitised and no details of the facts of life are assumed.

Religion: mass is attended and brief references to the mother's faith and its nature are made.

Anything else: I think some background on the war in Italy (and how the Italians ended up occupied by the Germans) would aid enjoyment.

Overall: I loved this book and can see it achieving classic status. The plot and the children's adventures were believable, the fear realistic but not too overwhelming, the setting of the streets and countryside of Florence admirably evoked with an artist's eye. I also liked that there were sympathetic Italians and Germans, and that no one nationality was the arch-bad-guy. If your child is solidly unflappable in the face of fictional peril then this book is suitable across the whole age range but it is not for the faint-hearted of any age.

Other reviews and useful sites:

The book has its own site with a lot of useful background detail.

Hero on a Bicycle was shortlisted for the Blue Peter prize.

There are reviews on The Guardian and on An Awfully Big Blog Adventure (blog run by a number of chidlren's authors) 

There's also a great reveiw on Did you ever stop to think & forget to start again?

The Case of the Deadly Desperados by Caroline Lawrence

The Case of the Deadly Desperados is the first of the PK Pinkerton mysteries by Caroline Lawrence, best known for the Roman Mysteries.

My name is PK Pinkerton and before this day is over I will be dead.

From the very first we're involved in the thick of it with PK Pinkerton in the Wild West of the nineteeenth-century. The foster parents of Pinky are dead, scalped and apparently killed by Indians. Pinky, however, is no ordinary 12 year old, having skills in hunting and tracking, and it becomes evident that three men hunting for Pinky are responsible for killing Pinky's foster parents. Pinky's skills are great but Pinky also has a "thorn":

But here is my Problem: I cannot tell if a person's smile is genuine or false. I can only spot three emotions: happiness, fear and anger. And sometimes I even mix those up.

Pinky seems to have problems somewhere on the Asperberger's / Autism spectrum. Pinky's talents and hinderences coincide to make this a truly exciting book. Pinky can get out of tight corners with talents you wouldn't suspect, and yet is easily trapped when those of us with more conventional personalities can see the problem coming. This makes for a plot that is both character led (my favourite sort) and unpredictable.

Running from the deperados Pinky sets off for the "Satan's playground" and "vilest place on earth" Virginia City where Pinky immediately meets a "Soiled Dove" (the slang in this book is great - very evocative) and the adventures truly begin, as Pinky dodges the deperados and tries to protect the document that everyone seems to be after. Pinky has no idea who to trust and with the "thorn" often mis-judges character. Pinky's uncle is the detective Allan Pinkerton and Pinky tries to detect too "like Mr Bucket in Bleak House".

The narrative has a surface simplicity in the words of Pinky, but is actually subtle, complex and tricky as a snake. You may have noticed that I've avoided using a pronoun for Pinky. There's a good reason for this: I've no idea which pronoun would be right!

Watch Points:

Violence: it with begins the murder of Pinky's parents and their scalping is presented in modest detail. There is a torture scene where someone has a finger cut off by Whittlin’ Walt who hacks his victims to death little bit by little bit. There are shootings and fights and other moderate violence.

Death: as noted it begins with the deaths of Pinky's parents. Other characters are killed throughout the book.

Peril: Pinky's parents' deaths show the enormity of the danger from the start. Pinky learns about Whittlin’ Walt and exactly what he does (see violence, above) a bit later. The opening line shows Pinky waiting to die and there is the inevitable showdown to resolve the predicament at the end. Throughout Pinky is on the run.

Relationships: awareness of the facts of life is assumed. There are numerous "Soiled Doves" (prostitutes), and the complex circumstances of Pinky's birth are discussed.

Anything else: yes, drugs. Belle, the "Soiled Dove", is hooked on opium. Pinky has to visit an opium den where Belle is stoned out of her mind.

Overall: this a swift paced and sharply drawn piece of crime fiction dressed up as a glorious Western. There are lots of genres to discuss, the narration is stylishly done, and there is a wonderful cast of minor characters from Poker Face Jace to local news reporter Sam Clemens (yes, him). The setting  is vivid with its evangelical Christians, and its prostitutes, gangsters, Chinese laundries, saloon bars, and card sharps and its evolving landscape of the new town and its silver mines slapped down in the scorching desert. The speech is great and I loved the slang: one could write paragraphs on "soiled dove" as a metaphor, and I learnt what you do to 'mark twain'. I loved it and I'm delighted that there is a sequel.

Other reviews and useful sites:

The author's blog is here, and she has a page on the slang used in this book here. Her book website is here.

There are reveiws on The Bookette, The New York Times, and The Telegraph, and this latter also has "reading notes" for a book club.

The Ruby in the Smoke by Philip Pullman.

As a piece of quality literature for stretching bright readers The Ruby in the Smoke has everything: superbly twisty plot, great characterisation, a luminous historical setting, page turning readability, wonderful writing. It is however a tad violent.

Sally Lockhart has lost her father at sea, and has only a few pieces of information as to what has happened. Within the first few pages she utters one of these snippets to a colleague of her father's and he falls down dead. (How very Wilkie Collins!) The plot has us as ensnared as Sally herself.

On her travels she meets with Jim the office boy, Frederick Garland a photographer and his actress sister Rosa, their manservant "Trembler" with the iffy past (how very Charles Dickens!) and the child Adelaide. Together they solve the mystery of Sally's father's death, and deal with threats haunting Sally herself, with help of a drug addict sailor and a boxing vicar.

The characters and relationships are wonderful. "Skulking bankrupt!" yells Rosa at Frederick, "Howling termagant!" shrieks Frederick at his sister, before turning to introduce her to Sally in all good humour. Robust Trembler and timid rescued child Adelaide make up the rest of this strange household. Jim the office boy is dogged in his loyalty to Sally and the others in their adventures, after being dedicated to sensational thrillers all his short life.

The resolution is very satisfactory but includes something of a hanging thread, that is both realistic (life rarely ties things up neat and tidy) and leads to the other books of this quartet. There is not a clear cut happy ending. I should add that despite the subject matter this a remarkably light narrative: the subject is dark but the tone is clean and crisp and light. The good characters shared a flawed warmth, and the narrative is often very witty.

Watch points:

Violence: lots and lots. Fights and kidnappings, broken bones and more. Quite high levels of gruesomeness and because Pullman is so good, the reader is pulled firmly into these situations. The queasy will feel ill, and the timid, terrified. The fight where Frederick and Jim try to defend Adelaide ends with both of them taking quite graphic beatings, and it is not so much the peril involved as the superb descriptions of pain as broken arms give way when weight is put on them, that might un-nerve your readers. The quality of Pullman's writing makes the violence so much worse as you can feel the effects.

Peril: lots. See above. Sally is often in danger and her friends too get hurt. Mrs Holland and her henchman Mr Berry are pretty scary as the villains. They menace in quite an adult way.

Death: apart from Sally's father, several other characters die or disappear. It is wise not to get too attached to anyone!

Drugs: one character is an opium addict and this is a major part of the plot. His downfall through drugs is very clear, so although there is much on drugs, it is not at all moral ambiguous in this case. Less morally clear is the fact that Sally has faint memories of a significant event in her childhood. When she accidentally breathes opium the memories become clearer and more significantly Sally wonders whether she should deliberate use the drug to access the memories. In the end she does. This is more morally ambiguous than the descriptions of the drug addict sailor.

Relationships: Sally is obviously becoming attached to Frederick and Jim has a more juvenile crush on Rosa. Sally's feelings are sweetly and subtly handled.

Overall: this is a well written historical thriller and as such it thrills well! It is obviously intended for a YA audience so this is no horror fest, but it is a very effective way to scare yourself silly in a good way. Beware the nausea levels for some of the fights. Beware the drugs if you don't want to have an extended conversation with your child/class/book group about historical context, Victorian opium addictions, and how this relates to the modern world of drug use. Sally is a wonderful, believable, carefully drawn character and it is a pleasure to spend the book with her. I loved this book, and it made me sad that I didn't read it when it came out in 1985: at 13 years old this would have become my favourite book to date I'm sure.

Other reviews and resources:

The author's page on the book is here.

Coffee Clef blog review.

Author DL Morrese 's review on his blog.

TES teaching resources page (you need to create a free account and log in to open the links).

 

 

Troll Fell by Katherine Langrish

Troll Fell by Katherine Langrish has a pacy start. Peer's father is dead and bursting into the funeral is a particularly ghastly version of a wicked uncle. The uncle takes Peer away, in a rather brutal manner, and Peer and Loki his dog begin a new life in the valley of Trollsvik living with his wicked uncles and making friends with his neighbour Hilde who's father has gone off in a longboat.

A lively mix of Viking myths and other recognisable fairy tales, Troll Fell is engaging from start to finish. Hilde and Peer both have troubles in the absence of a father, and their fates coincide when Peer's uncles need a matching boy and girl to sell to the trolls as wedding pages. Like all fairy tales, the end is resolved satisfactorily, but the characters are engaging enough for you to think about book two in the series with some anticipation.

It is probably a bit too fairy tale like for the older end of our age group unless they have very keen on this kind of saga.

Watch points:

Peril: There's quite a lot of danger. Peer is often under threat from his uncles. Hilde and her family are under threat from trolls. One of the worst bits is when Peer's uncles decide to fight their enormous hound against Peer's tiny dog Loki. This is portrayed as down right planned murder, and the thought of a child thinking their dog was going to be torn to death in front of them made me blanch aged 40, so may well upset some children. Loki lives, how could he not.

Death: it begins with a funeral pyre which is an interesting talking point. Lots of people nearly die but there is much last minute avoiding of this.

Summary:much as I loved this book its relatively young protangonists, and fairy tale quality, may make it feeel a bit young for those old enough to handle the levels of peril. For the right child, it will be a hit, but I'd avoid with a book group as this won't suit everyone. It is beautifully written, and I did love it.

Also:

The author's wonderful blog may be of interest.

There are other reviews:

The Guardian has a review by Jan Mark  which is less enthusiastic than I am.

There is a postive review on Kirkus.

Nation by Terry Pratchett

Nation by Terry Pratchett is a wonderful book. A slightly slow start that potentially might be a bit confusing for those without a knowledge of English constitutional history. The beginning would be better summarised for readers at the top end of primary school, before they start. Once it gets going it is a dramatic and funny book dealing with some of life's big issues.

Mau is a boy on the edge of manhood. He leaves his island in the Pacific Ocean to complete the rituals to become a man in his community's tradition. Ermintrude aka Daphne is a bored young lady in London in an alternative verison of the mid-nineteenth century. She wants to become a scientist but her grandmother just likes her to embroider,  in case 138 people die and Ermintrude becomes queen. Two things then happen: whilst Ermintrude is on her way to meet her father, a governor in some far-flung Pacific outpost of Empire, and Mau is paddling his canoe back to his island, a tsunami smashes ship and canoe alike. The little canoe survives, but the ship is smashed into the island. There are now only three survivors from these vessels on the island: Mau, Ermintrude and a parrot with an extensive and colouful vocabulary. Meanwhile, 137 people have died of the plague back in London and Ermintrude's father is now king. The race is on to find the king and his daughter, whilst Mao and Ermintrude have to learn to comunicate and to survive. Ermintrude is now Daphne.

Watch points:

Bad Language: mainly from the parrot, and generally appropriate for even the youngest in our age group.

Relationships:  Assumes some simple knowledge of the facts of life.

Shows developing feelings of Mao and Daphne, but not in great detail. Mentions Daphne wondering how babies are born and she has to help a mother in labour. The most graphic moment is when Daphne looks up the mother-to-be's skirt and says, "So that's how babies are born!"

Violence: includes some moderate violence for the age group, both natural and human. Mao's entire village is wiped out and he has to deal with the bodies. The characters also go into the caves of the ancestors where there are detailed descriptions of dead bodies in various states of decay. Both main characters have to kill someone. Pirates arrive and there is a fight. An ear is blown off by a gun. Cannibals are often referred to but mainly humorously. Slavery amongst the pirates is briefly referred to. A mutiny is described but the details are mainly, though not entirely, comic.

Religion: The Christian God and the native Gods are discussed throughout.

Both main characters question the tradional religious beliefs of their own cultures heavily throughout the book. Mao rails against his Gods repeatedly and has an ongoing intellectual war with a priest who arrives. Charles Darwin and Richard Dawkins are both mentioned with a strong humanist slant, though by the end the philsophical tone on the existence of God, and the origins of the universe, is more equivocal. There is a strong sense of wonderment, rather than conventional religious belief.

Peril: Occasional. Moderate, for the older end of the age group.

Anything else?: there's a some eugh moments, such as Mao needing to milk a pig for a new born baby with no mother.

Summary: an entertaining book with some strong intellectual challenges on the subjects of death,  God, science, gender roles, empire, identity, duty and justice. In my opinion most suitable for the 11-14 end of our age group, but may be okay with 9-11 year olds who know there are some facts of life and have strong stomachs.