Difference between revisions of "Newest Teens Reviews"

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[[Category:Teens|*]]
 
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Leanne Egan
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|title=Lover Birds
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|rating=4.5
[[image:1509852883.jpg|link=http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1509852883/ref=nosim?tag=thebookbag-21
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|genre=Teens
]]
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|summary=When new girl, Isabel, moves to Lou's hometown of Liverpool from London Lou immediately feels Isabel's disdain for everything around her.  A misunderstanding between them leaves them hating each other, but Lou feels her pulse racing every time she looks at Isabel or speaks with her, and that's definitely because Isabel makes her feel so cross, isn't it?  Because Lou is straight, isn't she?  Even though none of her relationships with boys have gone very well so far, and she's never had a good kiss with any of them?  So she just finds herself watching Isabel, and wanting to hang out with her because fighting with her is fun, and she definitely just hates Isabel, doesn't she?
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|isbn=000862657X
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Ashley Hickson-Lovence
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|title=Wild East
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=Written in verse, this is Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to Norwich and start at a mostly white school. The move is initiated by Ronny's mum who is worried for Ronny's safety after a tragic event, and so Ronny finds himself trying to settle in a new town, a new school, and keep himself out of trouble. He listens to music constantly, and has always dreamed of being a rapper. But now, in this new school, his teacher encourages him to be part of a poetry writing workshop group and, slowly, Ronny begins to see the connections between rap and poetry, and the power of creativity and crafting your words.
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|isbn=0241645441
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Jenny Valentine
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|title=Us in the Before and After
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|rating=5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=Elk and Mab are best friends, or more than that even, their friendship is a once in a lifetime connection.  They meet as children one day on a trip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the time.  But then chance brings them back together, and they are inseparable.  Something has happened though, something terrible and tragic, and now they must work through their grief, and their friendship, together.
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|isbn=1471196585
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Max Boucherat
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|title=The Last Life of Lori Mills
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Confident Readers
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|summary=We meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesome.  What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has one main intention, and that is to log on to Voxminer, the world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Lori's world.  But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, and then she finds something even more spooky.  For the server she and her bestie and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of tampering.  When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, and her safe place in the game has been doctored – well, where is a girl to turn?
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|isbn=0008666482
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Rachel Greenlaw
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|title=Compass and Blade
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|rating=3.5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.''
  
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Rosevear, a remote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she holds most dear.
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|isbn=0008664730
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Harry Allen
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|title=Children of the Sun
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|rating=5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary= Ra Eun Seo lives in a North Korean town and she is a talented singer. Life is hard and food is difficult to come by, so Seo and her friends Nari and Min go foraging every evening, looking for tree bark and edible grasses to supplement the meagre rations of rice and kimchi at home.
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|isbn=1805140493
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Alexia Casale
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|title=Sing if you Can't Dance
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|rating=5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=It's hard enough to navigate your teenage years without suddenly finding that you're having to navigate a life-changing disability too, but that's what Ven is dealing with after collapsing on stage in the middle of a dance performance that was going to change her life.  But she comes back fighting, desperate to avoid the pity stares, and desperate to get back to a life that's as normal as she can possibly manage.  Meanwhile there's a new (cute!) boy in school, her music A Level performance piece to try to sort out, and just the day to day traumas of all the challenges her body continues to throw at her to navigate.  So even though she can't dance anymore, might she be able to sing her way through instead?
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|isbn=0571373801
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Simon Fox
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|title=Deadlock
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Confident Readers
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|summary=Late one night Graham Blake is late back from his shift on the force, and then suddenly rings Archie, demanding he fetch something from a secret place, and join him on the run.  They get together, but barely begin to smell the whiff of Southern trains when the father is arrested, leaving Archie on the late express to Brighton, toting a tin his father was determined to keep away from his colleagues, and the bearer of a whole heap of questions.
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|isbn=1839944420
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Lex Croucher
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|title=Gwen and Art Are Not in Love
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|rating=4
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=Who knew that what I really needed to read right now was a gay Arthurian RomCom?  But honestly, it lifted my spirits in a most delightful way.  In this story, Gwen and Arthur have been betrothed since they were tiny, much to their mutual disgust!  Gwen, you see, is in love with Bridget (the kingdom's only female knight) - something that Art discovers from her private diaries.  And then when Gwen then catches Art kissing a boy they find themselves becoming reluctant allies, creating the subterfuge of falling in love with each other, when really they are enabling their own other romantic attachments.  But as their impending wedding draws ever closer, will they find a way in which they can both truly be themselves, or are they destined to live a lie their whole lives?
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|isbn=1526651793
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Nick Brooks
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|title=Promise Boys
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|rating=4
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=When the principal (headmaster) of Urban Promise Prep school is murdered, three boys find themselves called into the police station as suspects.  Each, seemingly, has a grudge of some description against Principal Moore, and each could have been there at the time of his murder.  But who killed him, and why, and if any of the boys are innocent, will they be able to clear their names?
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|isbn=1035003155
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=1919635017
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|title=A Thief to Catch a Killer
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|author=Kitt Townsend
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary= Solomon Klyne isn't a bad lad, so why is he running around London committing a series of robberies? And how did he learn to crack safes? You'll have to wait to get an answer to the second question because I avoid spoilers. But I'll answer the first one: for his grandmother...
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Patrick Ness and Tea Bendix
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|title=Different for Boys
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=Ant is in Year Eleven at quite a standard school, and is surprised to find his geography class (within which it seems absolutely nothing about geography is ever learnt) has been restructured, so his desk is one of four with both his best buddy from the football team, and two other old muckers – in fact they all go back to primary school days together.  As they're all fired up, straining at the leash only a single-sex school can form, the talk in class and out often turns to sex.  Which is confusing for Ant, as he doesn't know what his score is, where his achievements in that regard lie.  He's had a casual relationship, a secret one, for several months now, and so has effectively progressed up the ladder headed by 'experienced', but whether that's set in stone, he can't be sure.  And that's mostly because of who he's been having the relationship and the sex with.
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|isbn=1529509491
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=1800901232
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|title=Stitched Up
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|author=Steve Cole
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|rating=5
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|genre=Dyslexia Friendly
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|summary=Twelve-year-old Hanh wanted to be a fashion designer.  Life in the rural village where she lived with her family was happy, if not prosperous, so when the smartly-dressed man and woman came to the village to offer Hahn a job in Hanoi it was an opportunity not to be missed.  Some money changed hands and Hanh was on the mini-bus to Hanoi.  Only, Hanh and the other girls were not going to work in a shop, they were to work in virtual slavery in an illegal garment factory.  You know those jeans you really wanted: the ones with intricate embroidery and beading on the legs?  The ones with the artfully-placed rips and distressed seams that felt so soft when you touched them?  It's quite possible that Hanh and her co-workers made them.
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Patrice Lawrence
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|title=Needle
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|rating=3
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=Brave. Charlene, the 'heroine' of this piece is extremely hard for some people to like, characters and readers both.  Kicked out of multiple homes and schools, she's fostering with a pleasant yoga tutor, Annie, and has taken up residence in her son Blake's old room while he's at uni. Such a tempestuous personality may be in need of a comfort blanket, you might perhaps think, and the creation of one such item is part of the plot here, as Charlene is a wonder knitter, and is making something full of love for her younger sister – a younger sister she's allowed contact with no more. We see Charlene prove her belligerence with a store detective, and then force people to give her two days off school, when she shouts someone down as expletively ignorant. And then... well, what exactly happens is not for me to say, only to remark how sharp and pointy those knitting needles can be...
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|isbn=1800901011
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author= Ann Sei Lin
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|title= Rebel Skies
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|rating= 5
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|genre= Teens
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|summary= Kurara has spent her entire life as a servant on the Midori, a massive dining hall floating in the sky where soldiers of the Empire come to drink and make merry between their conquests. However, when a man named Himura arrives to tell her that she is a Crafter like him, someone with the power to form paper into whatever she desires – a power sought after all across the Empire. He asks her to come with him, to leave the life of dreary servitude that is all she has known. Well, soon Kurara won't have any say in the matter, because the Midori is destroyed by a monstrous paper spirit known as a shikigami, and she is forced to flee out into the world. She joins Himura aboard the Orihime, a sky-ship whose express purpose is to hunt down shikigami, and a whole world of adventure awaits her…
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|isbn=1406399590
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Marcus Sedgwick
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|title=Wrath
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary=Meet Fitz, a young Scottish lad full of frustration at himself. Lockdown is only just over, and he should be free to do what he wants, to go where he wants and with whom he wants, but he cannot stop himself from putting his foot in it when he talks to his best friend, Cassie. They were half of a desultory school band, but Cassie was also one hundred per cent the enigmatic – saying she could hear a subhuman hum coming from the earth. Is this connected with one of her eco-warrior parents saying the end of the world is already a done deal? Is it some spooky new kind of music she's dreaming of? Is she just bonkers? And can Fitz find out the truth? Well, not when Cassie has gone missing he can't...
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|isbn=1800900899
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Tori Bovalino
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|title=The Devil Makes Three
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Teens
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|summary= Working all summer in her boarding school's library is the last thing Tess Matheson wants to do — especially when she gets a request for over a hundred books that she has to deliver herself. What makes it worse is the man who requested the books: Mr Birch. The boarding school's headmaster, and a man Tess hates. As a petty act of revenge for making her find and deliver such a large request, Tess sticks post-it notes on each of the books, scribbled with the ugliest insults she can think of. They're never meant to reach him, of course. Her plan is to get her anger out like this, and then take them all off before delivering them. No harm done… Or it would be, if someone hadn't delivered them for her.
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|isbn=1789098130
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Philip Reeve
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|title=Utterly Dark and the Face of the Deep
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|rating=5
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|genre=Confident Readers
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|summary=In a word, rich. There is certainly an abundance of riches in this story set on a peculiar island called Wildsea, British but way west, beyond the Scillies. There are troll people on it, and sea-witches, and legends of the Dark family that has to keep watch for magical islands and their monster approaching from even further west, where no ship dare sail. The current Darks are the Watcher, Andrewe, who has to keep notes of activity from the Hidden Lands, his brother Will who lives in London with too much science in his head to worry about such local yokel superstitions, and Andrewe's foundling daughter, who washed up out of the sea one day eleven years ago. But when Andrewe Dark drowns himself, both his sullen brother and his curious ward are thrust into the world of protecting their island, like it or not.
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|isbn=1788452372
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston
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|title=Julia and the Shark
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|rating=4
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|genre=Confident Readers
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|summary=Julia, our pre-teen heroine, has been packed off with her parents and their cat from the family home in SW England to be lighthousekeepers for a summer, in the far NE of the Scottish islands.  Here be Vikings, that kind of Scottish island.  Dad is going to be automating the lantern, which is his specialist thing, while mum will be leaving her career in algae behind to hunt the elusive Greenland shark.  And Julia, well, she will be homesick and alone – until she suddenly finds company one night.
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|isbn=1510107789
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}}
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{{Frontpage
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|author= Jonathan Stroud
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|title= The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne
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|rating= 4
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|genre= Teens
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|summary= Scarlett McCain is an outlaw, rejecting the draconian conformity of the Surviving Towns and Faith Houses to wander the wildlands between the Seven Kingdoms of Britain, robbing banks and shooting other outlaws to keep herself alive. But then she meets Albert Browne, a dark boy with dark powers and a darker past. With mysterious militiamen hunting them down, they plan to flee to the mythical Free Isles of the London Lagoon. Together, they must brave man-eating wildlife, the cannibalistic Tainted and all the horrors of post-apocalyptic society to reach the Free Isles, but will they be any more accepted there than they are in the rest of Britain?
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|isbn=1406394815
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}}
  
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Move on to [[Newest Thrillers Reviews]]
 
 
===[[Fierce Fragile Hearts by Sara Barnard]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
It's two years since Suzanne hit rock bottom. She's had extensive therapy and a stint with a lovely foster family. And now she's eighteen and must leave the Looked After system. Suzanne is apprehensive but excited. She's found herself a job, a bedsit has been rented, and she's about to return to Brighton, the only place she's ever felt truly at home, and to Caddy and Rosie, her two best friends.  [[Fierce Fragile Hearts by Sara Barnard|Full Review]]
 
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===[[All the Lonely People by David Owen]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Kat and Wesley are both loners, looking for places to fit in. Kat finds this with online communities, where she feels like she can be her true self - a feminist, an activist, someone who isn't scared to speak out. Wesley's desire to feel a sense of belonging sees him fall in with an altogether nastier crowd. Bullies, trolls, extremists. When he pulls the final trigger on a violent, targeted online bullying campaign, Kat is forced to delete her entire online presence. Bereft of everything that represented her identity, Kat's physical self starts to fade as well. As the entire world slowly forgets that Kat ever existed, only Wesley seems to remember the girl whom he erased. Wesley is faced with a choice: get sucked further into a sinister alt-right movement or help Kat to stop them.  [[All the Lonely People by David Owen|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Whiteout (Red Eye) by Gabriel Dylan]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]],  [[:Category:Horror|Horror]] 
 
 
 
Are you up for a sleepless night or two? If so, read on!
 
 
 
Charlie is on a school trip, skiing in the Austrian mountains. He's not having much fun. A miserable home life has given Charlie a bad attitude reputation and he's not a popular kid. Charlie tends to go off by himself - not always a safe thing to do if you're staying in a ski resort - and this is what brings him into contact with one of the ski guides, Hanna. Hanna herself doesn't have the happiest backstory and this forms a connection between them. [[ Whiteout (Red Eye) by Gabriel Dylan  |Full Review]] 
 
 
 
 
 
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===[[One Shot by Tanya Landman]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Dyslexia Friendly|Dyslexia Friendly]], [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
''Pa and I understood each other. Our souls were cut from the same cloth.'' But Pa has since died, leaving Maggie very much alone in her family. She was the only one of three children who looked like him, and none of the others acted like him, and certainly his wife didn't seem to fully understand him. Maggie might as well be reliving the Cinderella story, stuck with two siblings and mother that are fully against her. But at least she can sneak out at night, and shoot some game to stop them from starving? Well, no, not where her mother is concerned – the very idea of a female shooting things, when they could be preparing for a life of unhappy married drudgery, is just scandalous. [[One Shot by Tanya Landman|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[A Curse So Dark and Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
Harper's life is pretty disastrous at the moment, through no fault of her own. Her mother has cancer and not long to live. Her father has scarpered but not taken his debts with him. And her brother is forever getting into trouble. But Harper soldiers on nonetheless, despite coping with her own cerebral palsy. One day, she sees an attempted abduction of young girl and intercedes, only to find herself kidnapped in the girl's place. But even an imaginative girl like Harper couldn't have guessed where she was being taken...  [[A Curse So Dark and Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Pebble (Strong Winds series) by Julia Jones]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]], [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]]
 
 
 
Liam isn't ''quite'' the youngest in a large family: he doesn't have the distinction of being the baby anymore and he doesn't have the ''heft'' of his older brothers and sisters.  He's rather like one of the pebbles on a large shingle beach: part of the mass but easily overlooked as an individual.  So when he starts having problems with his sight no one really takes any notice.  He doesn't want to bother his mother as she's heavily involved in the Luminal Festival and when he asked his elder step-sister, Anna, if she'll take him for an eye test, she puts him off.  In fairness she's got important exams and Liam's convinced that it's just a case of getting spectacles, but Liam's eyes are changing in a rather strange way. [[Pebble (Strong Winds series) by Julia Jones|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[A Pinch of Magic by Michelle Harrison]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
''No Widdershins girl has ever been able to leave Crowstone. If we do, we'll die by the next sunset. ''
 
 
 
''A Pinch of Magic'' follows three sisters – Betty, Fliss and Charlie – who have lived on the isle of Crowstone, infamous for its surrounding marshes and the neighbouring inescapable prison, for their entire lives. The middle sister, Betty, has longed for adventure for as long as she can remember and she is determined that nothing and no-one will prevent her from seeing everything that the world has to offer. But in setting out to do just that, she and her sisters discover a deadly curse which has haunted their family for generations. From their ancestors, as well as a lifetime trapped on Crowstone, they have each inherited a magical object – an old carpet bag, a set of wooden nesting dolls and an antique handheld mirror – all of which are more than meets the eye and could possibly be the key to their problem. [[A Pinch of Magic by Michelle Harrison|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Lark by Anthony McGowan]]===
 
 
 
[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Dyslexia Friendly|Dyslexia Friendly]], [[:Category:Teens|Teens]], [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]]
 
 
 
I'll warn you first.
 
 
 
This is the fourth and last story about Nicky and Kenny. Try not to cry before you've even read the first page.
 
 
 
Things have got tense at home - again - for Nicky and his learning-disabled brother Kenny. Their mum is coming to visit - the mum who abandoned them a long time ago. They haven't seen her for years and the impending visit is stirring up a lot of uncomfortable feelings. And Nicky's girlfriend has ended things. To take their minds off it all, Nicky and Kenny plan a day out, trekking across the moors. But it doesn't go to plan and an accident puts both boys - and their dog, Tina, in terrible danger. [[Lark by Anthony McGowan|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Only the Ocean by Natasha Carthew ]]===
 
 
 
[[image:5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Kel Crow lives with a heart defect that could kill her at any time. Her only hope is to escape the floodridden, waterlogged Cornish world she lives in, to leave her drug-running family far behind, and get to America with enough money for an operation. She has a plan: stowaway on a ship, kidnap a rich girl, exchange the girl for enough money for the journey to America and the surgery that will change her life.  [[Only the Ocean by Natasha Carthew |Full Review]]
 
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===[[Two Dark Reigns by Kendare Blake]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]], [[:Category:Fantasy|Fantasy]]
 
 
 
''You cannot put on a costume and become something else. You are a queen of Fennbirn island.''
 
 
Following on from [[Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake|Three Dark Crowns]] and its sequel [[One Dark Throne by Kendare Blake|One Dark Throne]], in ''Two Dark Reigns'' each of the Goddess' daughters have their own battles to fight. All her life, Katharine has dreamed of being the great Queen the island of Fennbirn deserves. Having won the crown though, she is facing trial after difficult trial and murmurs of dissent and revolution grow louder on the streets each and every day. And without evidence of her sisters' death does anyone but herself and the old queens buried under her skin, believe she is the one true Queen? [[Two Dark Reigns by Kendare Blake|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Paper Avalanche by Lisa Williamson]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Ro Snow spends her time at school trying to pass under the radar.  She doesn't want anyone to notice her, because then they might start asking questions, or they might want to be friends, and she can't have any friends because she can't ever have anyone come over to her house.  You see, Ro's mum is a hoarder, and their whole house, with the exception of Ro's bedroom, is an ever-growing mound of rubbish and paper, and Ro lives in fear of social services finding out and taking her away. [[Paper Avalanche by Lisa Williamson|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[What if It's Us by Becky Albertelli and Adam Silvera]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
''I believe in love at first sight. Fate, the universe, all of it. But not how you're thinking. I don't mean it in the our souls were split and you're my other half forever and ever sort of way. I just think you're meant to meet some people. I think the universe nudges them into your path.''
 
 
 
''What If It's Us'' is one of those books that just gives you a boost when you need it. A feel good, fun and easy read. I was surprised at the collaboration of Silvera and Albertalli – one known for happy endings, the other for tragedy – but they really work together well. Each takes a character and their voices are so distinct, so real, that you are immediately sucked in. [[What if It's Us by Becky Albertelli and Adam Silvera|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Broken Things by Lauren Oliver]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Thrillers|Thrillers]], [[:Category:Crime|Crime]], [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
''This is the problem with words and even stories: there is never one truth''
 
 
 
Summer, Mia and Brynn are obsessed with a novel called ''The Way into Lovelorn''. They begin to believe it is real, that the world of Lovelorn is really materialising around them, and start writing their own fan-fiction sequel.  One day, Summer is violently murdered in the woods where they all played and everyone thinks Mia and Brynn did it. [[Broken Things by Lauren Oliver|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Blue Sky Black by John Connors]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
''When Tom Allenby, the 14 year-old boy who can control the elements, sees metal objects and cars rising into the air one night he knows he is facing a powerful enemy. The trail leads to stolen magnetic stones, sinister experiments in an old country house and a village hiding a secret. As each of his friends faces challenges of their own, can Tom fight a force which knows all about them?''
 
 
 
Of course he can! [[ Blue Sky Black by John Connors  |Full Review]] 
 
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===[[Dear Evan Hansen: The Novel by Val Emmich]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
Evan Hansen spends a lot of time indoors by himself. This worries his mother, who has engaged a therapist to try to help Evan with his extreme anxiety issues. Evan's therapist assigns him the task of writing a daily letter to himself as a way of getting Evan to think more constructively about himself and the world around him. But Connor Murphy, a rather scary boy at school, finds one of Evan's letters and gets the wrong end of the stick because Evan has mentioned Zoe, the girl he has a crush on and who is Connor's sister. [[Dear Evan Hansen: The Novel by Val Emmich|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Sisters of the Winter Wood by Rena Rossner]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Fantasy|Fantasy]], [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Raised in a small village surrounded by woodland on the border of Moldova and Ukraine, sisters Liba and Laya have lived a sheltered life - although there are whispers of troubling times ahead for Jews. When their grandfather takes ill, their parents must leave the sisters behind while they travel to his sickbed, but life for Liba and Laya is about to drastically change. Before their parents leave, Liba discovers that the fairy tales she heard as a child are in fact true as she learns that her Tati can turn in to a bear and her Mami in to a swan. Liba must carry this secret in order to help protect her sister, but the arrival of a mysterious group of men in the village carries more danger as Laya is dragged under their spell. Both sisters must stick together if they are to survive what is happening around them and they soon realise that their new-found magical heritage may be what saves them. [[The Sisters of the Winter Wood by Rena Rossner|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Snowglobe by Amy Wilson]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Confident Readers|Confident Readers]], [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Jago doesn't like Clementine. He knows there is something different about her and he doesn't like it. And he never lets her forget it. Clementine knows she's different too, and that the difference is magic. And as much as she tries to ignore it, Clementine's magic is getting stronger. So when Jago's bullying gets too much, it's not really surprising that Clem loses control of it and gets herself suspended from school.  [[Snowglobe by Amy Wilson|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Light Between Worlds by Laura Weymouth]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Five years ago Evelyn, Philippa and James Hapwell escaped to the safety of their air raid shelter as bombs fell all around the streets of London. In the terrifying darkness waiting for their parents to join them, Evelyn prayed to be anywhere else.
 
A plea that was answered by The Woodlands. One moment in grey London and the next surrounded by a rich green forest, the three children were transported from one world trapped in war, to another on the brink of its own. [[The Light Between Worlds by Laura Weymouth|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Only Love Can Break Your Heart by Katherine Webber]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Though it's been 5 years since Mika died, Reiko still sees the ghost of her sister every day, forever 14. It's something that brings her comfort, but also a constant reminder that she has to make up for being one when there should have been two. She has to shine bright enough for both of them. When she befriends outsider Seth, he presents her with an escape. From her family, her friends, the grief and loss that continue to scar them all. Seth is instantly smitten with her. After all, who wouldn't fall for gorgeous, popular Reiko Smith-Mori? But while she falls in love with the escape that he represents from her grief, it's not so clear that she's falling in love with him.  [[Only Love Can Break Your Heart by Katherine Webber|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Phantom by Leo Hunt]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Sixteen-year-old Nova is an undercity dweller and a leecher - a futuristic kind of pickpocket who uses tech hacks to steal byts from hapless corps workers. The higher up in the city you live, the more sunlight you see and the easier your life. For leechers like Nova, four hundred storeys below the surface, life is tough. But with the help of the hacking program Phantom, invented by legendary anti-corps hacker the Moth, Nova can sneak up to the city, leech some byts and at least make rent. v[[Phantom by Leo Hunt|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Truth About Lies by Tracy Darnton]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Jess is in a meeting with Dr Harrison, the school counsellor. Dr Harrison is hoping to help Jess come to terms with the death of her room-mate, Hanna. But he's not having much success, largely because Jess has no intention of telling him how she feels. Instead, she feigns a grief she does not feel so that he is satisfied and she gets out of there as quickly as possible. [[The Truth About Lies by Tracy Darnton|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[The Chaos of Now by Erin Lange]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]], [[:Category:Crime|Crime]]
 
 
 
Eli, a talented hacker, is one of those people who manage to fly below the radar. When new friends offer him the chance to enter a prestigious competition he soon realises this golden opportunity has a sting in its tail. How many people can hand on heart say that they have not made mistakes? Most people are fortunate not to have a permanent online reminder, the very presence of which refuses to allow you to adapt, to change, to grow.  Eli has a few mistakes skulking online, moments of madness that if discovered would change his life forever. [[The Chaos of Now by Erin Lange|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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===[[Colour Me In by Lydia Ruffles]]===
 
 
 
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Teens|Teens]]
 
 
 
Reeling from a tragedy and unable to cope, unemployed actor Arlo decides to get on a plane and go somewhere new. [[Colour Me In by Lydia Ruffles|Full Review]]
 
 
 
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Latest revision as of 09:54, 8 July 2024

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Review of

Lover Birds by Leanne Egan

4.5star.jpg Teens

When new girl, Isabel, moves to Lou's hometown of Liverpool from London Lou immediately feels Isabel's disdain for everything around her. A misunderstanding between them leaves them hating each other, but Lou feels her pulse racing every time she looks at Isabel or speaks with her, and that's definitely because Isabel makes her feel so cross, isn't it? Because Lou is straight, isn't she? Even though none of her relationships with boys have gone very well so far, and she's never had a good kiss with any of them? So she just finds herself watching Isabel, and wanting to hang out with her because fighting with her is fun, and she definitely just hates Isabel, doesn't she? Full Review

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Review of

Wild East by Ashley Hickson-Lovence

4.5star.jpg Teens

Written in verse, this is Ronny's story, a young black fourteen year old boy from Hackney who suddenly has to move to Norwich and start at a mostly white school. The move is initiated by Ronny's mum who is worried for Ronny's safety after a tragic event, and so Ronny finds himself trying to settle in a new town, a new school, and keep himself out of trouble. He listens to music constantly, and has always dreamed of being a rapper. But now, in this new school, his teacher encourages him to be part of a poetry writing workshop group and, slowly, Ronny begins to see the connections between rap and poetry, and the power of creativity and crafting your words. Full Review

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Review of

Us in the Before and After by Jenny Valentine

5star.jpg Teens

Elk and Mab are best friends, or more than that even, their friendship is a once in a lifetime connection. They meet as children one day on a trip out but unfortunately they don't get each other's contact details at the time. But then chance brings them back together, and they are inseparable. Something has happened though, something terrible and tragic, and now they must work through their grief, and their friendship, together. Full Review

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Review of

The Last Life of Lori Mills by Max Boucherat

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

We meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesome. What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has one main intention, and that is to log on to Voxminer, the world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Lori's world. But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, and then she finds something even more spooky. For the server she and her bestie and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of tampering. When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, and her safe place in the game has been doctored – well, where is a girl to turn? Full Review

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Review of

Compass and Blade by Rachel Greenlaw

3.5star.jpg Teens

I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.

Rosevear, a remote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she holds most dear. Full Review

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Review of

Children of the Sun by Harry Allen

5star.jpg Teens

Ra Eun Seo lives in a North Korean town and she is a talented singer. Life is hard and food is difficult to come by, so Seo and her friends Nari and Min go foraging every evening, looking for tree bark and edible grasses to supplement the meagre rations of rice and kimchi at home. Full Review

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Review of

Sing if you Can't Dance by Alexia Casale

5star.jpg Teens

It's hard enough to navigate your teenage years without suddenly finding that you're having to navigate a life-changing disability too, but that's what Ven is dealing with after collapsing on stage in the middle of a dance performance that was going to change her life. But she comes back fighting, desperate to avoid the pity stares, and desperate to get back to a life that's as normal as she can possibly manage. Meanwhile there's a new (cute!) boy in school, her music A Level performance piece to try to sort out, and just the day to day traumas of all the challenges her body continues to throw at her to navigate. So even though she can't dance anymore, might she be able to sing her way through instead? Full Review

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Review of

Deadlock by Simon Fox

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Late one night Graham Blake is late back from his shift on the force, and then suddenly rings Archie, demanding he fetch something from a secret place, and join him on the run. They get together, but barely begin to smell the whiff of Southern trains when the father is arrested, leaving Archie on the late express to Brighton, toting a tin his father was determined to keep away from his colleagues, and the bearer of a whole heap of questions. Full Review

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Review of

Gwen and Art Are Not in Love by Lex Croucher

4star.jpg Teens

Who knew that what I really needed to read right now was a gay Arthurian RomCom? But honestly, it lifted my spirits in a most delightful way. In this story, Gwen and Arthur have been betrothed since they were tiny, much to their mutual disgust! Gwen, you see, is in love with Bridget (the kingdom's only female knight) - something that Art discovers from her private diaries. And then when Gwen then catches Art kissing a boy they find themselves becoming reluctant allies, creating the subterfuge of falling in love with each other, when really they are enabling their own other romantic attachments. But as their impending wedding draws ever closer, will they find a way in which they can both truly be themselves, or are they destined to live a lie their whole lives? Full Review

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Review of

Promise Boys by Nick Brooks

4star.jpg Teens

When the principal (headmaster) of Urban Promise Prep school is murdered, three boys find themselves called into the police station as suspects. Each, seemingly, has a grudge of some description against Principal Moore, and each could have been there at the time of his murder. But who killed him, and why, and if any of the boys are innocent, will they be able to clear their names? Full Review

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Review of

A Thief to Catch a Killer by Kitt Townsend

4.5star.jpg Teens

Solomon Klyne isn't a bad lad, so why is he running around London committing a series of robberies? And how did he learn to crack safes? You'll have to wait to get an answer to the second question because I avoid spoilers. But I'll answer the first one: for his grandmother... Full Review

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Review of

Different for Boys by Patrick Ness and Tea Bendix

4.5star.jpg Teens

Ant is in Year Eleven at quite a standard school, and is surprised to find his geography class (within which it seems absolutely nothing about geography is ever learnt) has been restructured, so his desk is one of four with both his best buddy from the football team, and two other old muckers – in fact they all go back to primary school days together. As they're all fired up, straining at the leash only a single-sex school can form, the talk in class and out often turns to sex. Which is confusing for Ant, as he doesn't know what his score is, where his achievements in that regard lie. He's had a casual relationship, a secret one, for several months now, and so has effectively progressed up the ladder headed by 'experienced', but whether that's set in stone, he can't be sure. And that's mostly because of who he's been having the relationship and the sex with. Full Review

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Review of

Stitched Up by Steve Cole

5star.jpg Dyslexia Friendly

Twelve-year-old Hanh wanted to be a fashion designer. Life in the rural village where she lived with her family was happy, if not prosperous, so when the smartly-dressed man and woman came to the village to offer Hahn a job in Hanoi it was an opportunity not to be missed. Some money changed hands and Hanh was on the mini-bus to Hanoi. Only, Hanh and the other girls were not going to work in a shop, they were to work in virtual slavery in an illegal garment factory. You know those jeans you really wanted: the ones with intricate embroidery and beading on the legs? The ones with the artfully-placed rips and distressed seams that felt so soft when you touched them? It's quite possible that Hanh and her co-workers made them. Full Review

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Review of

Needle by Patrice Lawrence

3star.jpg Teens

Brave. Charlene, the 'heroine' of this piece is extremely hard for some people to like, characters and readers both. Kicked out of multiple homes and schools, she's fostering with a pleasant yoga tutor, Annie, and has taken up residence in her son Blake's old room while he's at uni. Such a tempestuous personality may be in need of a comfort blanket, you might perhaps think, and the creation of one such item is part of the plot here, as Charlene is a wonder knitter, and is making something full of love for her younger sister – a younger sister she's allowed contact with no more. We see Charlene prove her belligerence with a store detective, and then force people to give her two days off school, when she shouts someone down as expletively ignorant. And then... well, what exactly happens is not for me to say, only to remark how sharp and pointy those knitting needles can be... Full Review

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Review of

Rebel Skies by Ann Sei Lin

5star.jpg Teens

Kurara has spent her entire life as a servant on the Midori, a massive dining hall floating in the sky where soldiers of the Empire come to drink and make merry between their conquests. However, when a man named Himura arrives to tell her that she is a Crafter like him, someone with the power to form paper into whatever she desires – a power sought after all across the Empire. He asks her to come with him, to leave the life of dreary servitude that is all she has known. Well, soon Kurara won't have any say in the matter, because the Midori is destroyed by a monstrous paper spirit known as a shikigami, and she is forced to flee out into the world. She joins Himura aboard the Orihime, a sky-ship whose express purpose is to hunt down shikigami, and a whole world of adventure awaits her… Full Review

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Review of

Wrath by Marcus Sedgwick

4.5star.jpg Teens

Meet Fitz, a young Scottish lad full of frustration at himself. Lockdown is only just over, and he should be free to do what he wants, to go where he wants and with whom he wants, but he cannot stop himself from putting his foot in it when he talks to his best friend, Cassie. They were half of a desultory school band, but Cassie was also one hundred per cent the enigmatic – saying she could hear a subhuman hum coming from the earth. Is this connected with one of her eco-warrior parents saying the end of the world is already a done deal? Is it some spooky new kind of music she's dreaming of? Is she just bonkers? And can Fitz find out the truth? Well, not when Cassie has gone missing he can't... Full Review

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Review of

The Devil Makes Three by Tori Bovalino

4.5star.jpg Teens

Working all summer in her boarding school's library is the last thing Tess Matheson wants to do — especially when she gets a request for over a hundred books that she has to deliver herself. What makes it worse is the man who requested the books: Mr Birch. The boarding school's headmaster, and a man Tess hates. As a petty act of revenge for making her find and deliver such a large request, Tess sticks post-it notes on each of the books, scribbled with the ugliest insults she can think of. They're never meant to reach him, of course. Her plan is to get her anger out like this, and then take them all off before delivering them. No harm done… Or it would be, if someone hadn't delivered them for her. Full Review

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Review of

Utterly Dark and the Face of the Deep by Philip Reeve

5star.jpg Confident Readers

In a word, rich. There is certainly an abundance of riches in this story set on a peculiar island called Wildsea, British but way west, beyond the Scillies. There are troll people on it, and sea-witches, and legends of the Dark family that has to keep watch for magical islands and their monster approaching from even further west, where no ship dare sail. The current Darks are the Watcher, Andrewe, who has to keep notes of activity from the Hidden Lands, his brother Will who lives in London with too much science in his head to worry about such local yokel superstitions, and Andrewe's foundling daughter, who washed up out of the sea one day eleven years ago. But when Andrewe Dark drowns himself, both his sullen brother and his curious ward are thrust into the world of protecting their island, like it or not. Full Review

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Review of

Julia and the Shark by Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Julia, our pre-teen heroine, has been packed off with her parents and their cat from the family home in SW England to be lighthousekeepers for a summer, in the far NE of the Scottish islands. Here be Vikings, that kind of Scottish island. Dad is going to be automating the lantern, which is his specialist thing, while mum will be leaving her career in algae behind to hunt the elusive Greenland shark. And Julia, well, she will be homesick and alone – until she suddenly finds company one night. Full Review

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Review of

The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne by Jonathan Stroud

4star.jpg Teens

Scarlett McCain is an outlaw, rejecting the draconian conformity of the Surviving Towns and Faith Houses to wander the wildlands between the Seven Kingdoms of Britain, robbing banks and shooting other outlaws to keep herself alive. But then she meets Albert Browne, a dark boy with dark powers and a darker past. With mysterious militiamen hunting them down, they plan to flee to the mythical Free Isles of the London Lagoon. Together, they must brave man-eating wildlife, the cannibalistic Tainted and all the horrors of post-apocalyptic society to reach the Free Isles, but will they be any more accepted there than they are in the rest of Britain? Full Review

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