Difference between revisions of "Newest Teens Reviews"

From TheBookbag
Jump to navigationJump to search
 
(529 intermediate revisions by 4 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
 
[[Category:Teens|*]]
 
[[Category:Teens|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Teens]] __NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->
+
[[Category:New Reviews|Teens]]__NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author= Steven Camden
+
|author=Leanne Egan
|title= It’s About Love
+
|title=Lover Birds
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary= As an acclaimed hip-hop style performance poet, Steven Camden is skilful at painting evocative imagery with words. His second novel for teens enters the world of the film script, cleverly playing with cinematic intertextuality. It is a tale of past mistakes, violence, revenge, friendship and love. An emotive, powerful, thought provoking experience it rates a 4.5 because it lacks the magical ingredients of Camden’s debut, ‘Tape’. It doesn’t make the reader’s heart sing but it does put their nerves on edge. I challenge you not to shed a tear.
+
|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?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007511248</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=000862657X
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author= Jennifer Niven 
+
|author=Ashley Hickson-Lovence
|title= All the Bright Places
+
|title=Wild East
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary= Finch and Violet are both counting the days. Violet is on countdown to graduation, to getting away from the school and town that hold so many torturous memories. Finch, meanwhile has started from zero and is logging the number of days in a row he is awake. And he doesn’t mean that in terms of physically awake, but more so in terms of his emotions. Neither of them are particularly happy. At least one of them has a plan to make the pain stop in the most final way possible. It’s pretty horrific.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141357037</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0241645441
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Jodi Picoult and Samantha Van Leer
+
|author=Jenny Valentine
|title=Off the Page
+
|title=Us in the Before and After
|rating=4
+
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Many readers can identify with the idea of falling in love with a hero from a book. After all, they are written to be appealing, with rugged good looks, charming personality, strength and wit. But what if the hero from your favourite book came to life and joined you in the real world? Can a storybook romance flourish in a High School setting? Or will our fairytale prince be keen to return to his homeland of unicorns, fairies, castles and mermaids? These are the dilemmas faced by awkward teen Delilah and her fantasy prince Oliver, who swaps places with a human boy in order to join his true love in the real world. The lovers may be together for now, but the book has other ideas, and soon begins rewriting itself to put everything back to how it was.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473614287</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1471196585
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Melissa Marr
+
|author=Max Boucherat
|title=Made For You
+
|title=The Last Life of Lori Mills
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Eva Tilling comes from a wealthy, influential family and reigns supreme at school - she is well thought of and has expectations to live up to - nothing ever changes for her, but that’s just how things are in obsolete Jessup: nothing unusual or unexpected ever happens…
+
|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?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007584202</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0008666482
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|title=Read Me Like A Book
+
|author=Rachel Greenlaw
|author=Liz Kessler
+
|title=Compass and Blade
|rating=5
+
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=
+
|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.''
''Read Me Like A Book'' is both a coming-of-age and a coming-out story.
 
 
 
Ash feels as though everything is a mess. Her parents aren't getting on and Ash is terrified they're going to split up. She's struggling to keep up her relationships with her friends. She trying to decide whether or not to lose her virginity - and how exactly she even feels about the boy she might lose it with. She's falling behind in her grades at school and half of her is a rebellious teen who couldn't care less about it, while the other half is panicking that she might not get into university.
 
  
And if all that wasn't enough, Ash is struck by a bolt from the blue when she develops an almighty crush on Miss Murray, her English teacher...
+
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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780622090</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0008664730
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Melissa Landers
 
|title=Alienated
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Two years ago, aliens made contact. Now, Cara Sweeney has been chosen to host Aelyx, a L'eihr exchange student. The first exchange student. Cara gets a free ride to any college she chooses out of the deal, some excellent material for her blog, and a chance to be a part of history, helping in her own way to form an alliance between the two races.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1423185250</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Melissa Landers
+
|author=Harry Allen
|title=Invaded
+
|title=Children of the Sun
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary= To save the alliance between Humans and the L'eihr, and save the planet from the deadly algae blooms that threaten to destroy all life, Cara and Aeylx have to persuade the L'eihr that Humans and L'eihr can peacefully co-exist.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1423169492</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1805140493
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author= Simon Mayo
+
|author=Alexia Casale
|title= Itchcraft
+
|title=Sing if you Can't Dance
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary= Third book in the Itch sequence about the audacious, intrepid teen obsessed with collecting elements from the Periodic Table to the detriment of his own life. Electrifying, explosive, punchy and action packed tour de force sizzling with surprising shocks.
+
|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?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552569062</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0571373801
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Keren David
+
|author=Simon Fox
|title=This is not a Love Story
+
|title=Deadlock
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=This is a perfect holiday read – but that doesn't mean you need to be on holiday to read it. ''This Is Not A Love Story'' will waft you away from your bed or your fireside or your tube train seat and relocate you to Amsterdam.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0349001405</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1839944420
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Frances Hardinge
+
|author=Lex Croucher
|title=The Lie Tree
+
|title=Gwen and Art Are Not in Love
|rating=5
+
|rating=4
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Fans of Frances Hardinge will be familiar with the eerie, unreal atmosphere of her books. Mysteries lurk in the shadows, perplexing and sometimes menacing her characters, and the strange and the banal jostle each other for space on the page. A world both familiar and outlandish is offered to us, where once again a fallible but endearing heroine battles forces which threaten to overwhelm her at every turn.
+
|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?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>144726410X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1526651793
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Michael Byrne
+
|author=Nick Brooks
|title=Lottery Boy
+
|title=Promise Boys
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Twelve year old Bully and his mongrel dog, Jack, have been living rough for almost six months – ever since Bully's mum died. The future holds no hope until, quite by accident, he finds the lottery ticket he purchased for his mum hidden inside the last birthday card she gave him. He checks the numbers and discovers he's won the jackpot. But there's only days left before the ticket expires and Bully's not old enough to claim the money. To make matters worse, word of his winning ticket has got out and every unsavoury character on the streets is now after him.
+
|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?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406358290</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1035003155
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|title=Panther
+
|isbn=1919635017
|author=David Owen
+
|title=A Thief to Catch a Killer
 +
|author=Kitt Townsend
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Things have gone woefully wrong for Derrick. He's binge eating and his weight has spiralled. He's fallen out with his best friend. The girl he likes doesn't like him. He's in trouble at school. And if it weren't for his sister Charlotte, none of this shiznit would be happening. If Charlotte wasn't depressed, if she hadn't tried to... well, you know... everything would be fine, just like it used to be.
+
|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...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1472116429</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Katy Birchall
+
|author=Patrick Ness and Tea Bendix
|title=The It Girl
+
|title=Different for Boys
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Teens  
|summary= Anna is an awkward 14-year-old who is trying to fit in with people at her new school and convince them that she wasn’t actually trying to set her popular classmate’s hair on fire, it just happened. Her dad is a well-known journalist who’s just written a book, and they get on well - until he falls for a famous actress. With the paparazzi buzzing over the news of the engagement, Anna becomes a new target for them – but can this shy, nerdy girl cope with the sudden attention?
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140527817X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1529509491
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Taran Matharu
 
|title=The Novice
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=''The Novice'', Taran Matharu’s Wattpad sensation has already received a staggering five million reads. This book doesn’t just survive the hype; it deserves it.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444923978</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Kathy Reichs and Brendan Reichs
+
|isbn=1800901232
|title= Exposure (Virals 4)
+
|title=Stitched Up
|rating=5
+
|author=Steve Cole
|genre=Teens
 
|summary= In the fourth book of this electrifying sci-fi crime thriller series the resourceful teen Virals pit their wits against a cunning villain when two of their classmates go missing. An exciting adventure with a shocking twist.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099567245</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Lydia Syson
 
|title=Liberty's Fire
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Paris in the uneasy and violent months between March and May 1871 is an inspired setting for this tense, dramatic novel. ''Liberty's Fire'' is Lydia Syson's third work of fiction and certainly ensures that she will not be stereotyped into any single historical period.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147140367X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Melvin Burgess
 
|title=Persist
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Dyslexia Friendly
 
|genre=Dyslexia Friendly
|summary=When we first meet Marianne she's confusedPeople keep coming and looking at her, but they don't seem to see ''her''She wonders if she's something shiny, such as a mirrorHer family are desperate: Marianne has been in a coma for so long that even her mother is beginning to doubt that she can surface from wherever she is.  The doctors are sure that there's no hope for the girl and they're talking about switching off the machines which are keeping her alive, allowing her to fade away painlessly... It all comes to a head on Marianne's fifteenth birthday.
+
|summary=Twelve-year-old Hanh wanted to be a fashion designerLife 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 missedSome money changed hands and Hanh was on the mini-bus to HanoiOnly, 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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781124949</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Paul Dowswell
+
|author=Patrice Lawrence
|title=Bomber
+
|title=Needle
|rating=4.5
+
|rating=3
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Harry Friedman is only 17. But WWII is raging all across Europe and Harry felt the call to serve his country and the Allied cause. And that's how he became a gunner on the ''Macey May'', an American Flying Fortress stationed in East Anglia, far away from Harry's New York home.  
+
|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...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408858495</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1800901011
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Ben Davis
+
|author= Ann Sei Lin
|title=The Private Blog of Joe Cowley: Return of the Geek
+
|title= Rebel Skies
|rating=4
+
|rating= 5
|genre=Teens
+
|genre= Teens
|summary= Joe Cowley has got it bad.  Whatever ''it'' is, he's got it bad. The hots for his girlfriend, Natalie?  Bad.  Living arrangements with his ex-school-bullying-nemesis-turned-step-brother?  Very bad.  Some greasy swazz trying to take his girlfriend from him, at the same time as sucking up to her father who is also his business mentor?  Pretty awful.  An attitude that means a devil-may-care voice in his head leads him to support his oddball friends through a dance music competition just to get one over on the swazz?  You can guess, what with that being the main thrust of the plot here, that that too is B A D bad.
+
|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…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192736965</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1406399590
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Nicole Burstein
 
|title=Othergirl
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary= Imagine a world where superheroes are real and very much awesome. Imagine a teenage girl who discovers she has amazing powers, that she can fly and toss fire. And then imagine that you aren’t this girl, but rather her very normal best friend.  The one who patches up her friend's costume and covers for her at school, who worries and frets about her GCSEs while simultaneously planning how to get her friend noticed by the worldwide network of heroes, the Vigils. This isn't the story of Erica the superhero, but rather the story of Louise, loyal friend and sidekick.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1783440619</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Curtis Jobling
+
|author=Marcus Sedgwick
|title=Haunt: Dead Wrong
+
|title=Wrath
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary= Will and Dougie have been friends for ages. They each understand how the other thinks (well, most of the time) and they stick together through thick and thin. Literally, in fact: Will's dead but somehow he's not only unable to move on to whatever comes next, he actually can't stray more than a few feet away from his best friend. The possibilities for embarrassment are endless.
+
|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...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1471115798</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1800900899
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Kate Hendrick
 
|title=The Accident
 
|rating=2.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=The Accident alternates between three characters telling their story before, just after and much later than the day of the accident which connects them. Before the car crash, Eliat is a teenage mum knowing she needs to be an adult whilst never feeling more like a kid. Just after the car crash, Will is struggling to hold his dysfunctional family together when his oldest sister moves back home. Later, Sarah is struggling to move on with her life with the injuries and grief the accident has left her with. It’s a story about, whether we realise it or not, how we’re all connected by split-second decisions and we can’t control the impact they have.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1921922850</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Tori Bovalino
|author=Jandy Nelson
+
|title=The Devil Makes Three
|title=I'll Give You The Sun
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|genre=Teens
|summary=Twins Noah and Jude used to be inseparable until tragedy tore them apart. Now Noah's changed utterly from the boy he used to be, and Jude is reduced to spying on him through his friend as she struggles with her own issues at the exclusive art school Noah was always supposed to go to, but Jude ended up at instead.
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406326496</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1789098130
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=M G Harris
+
|author=Philip Reeve
|title=Gerry Anderson's Gemini Force One, Black Horizon
+
|title=Utterly Dark and the Face of the Deep
|rating=3.5
+
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Life is changing very fast for Ben Carrington. He is at the opening of a huge skyscraper hotel his late father founded in Abu Dhabi when disaster strikes – the chap is hardly cold in his grave when Ben's mum and the lad have to prove how adept they are at her old job, of mountain rescue. She feels like setting up a new rescue agency with her nous and the family fortunes, but someone who can just amble into the opening/memorial ceremony is Jason Truby, a monumentally rich Internet magnate, who actually has a modern-day ''Thunderbirds'' entity already, the top secret Gemini Force. Truby starts to get close to the family of two, but the school-aged Ben isn't going to be allowed to learn just what dramatic escapades the agency has to cover – is he?
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444014064</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1788452372
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Katy Cannon
+
|author=Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston
|title=Secrets, Schemes and Sewing Machines
+
|title=Julia and the Shark
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
+
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Grace is looking forward to being the star in the upcoming school production of Much Ado About Nothing, but after missing the audition, she's relegated to understudy and making costumes in sewing club. Being a costume mistress definitely wasn't the plan, but it may leave her in a position to step into the lead role if needed - and there's a compensation in the form of new boy Connor, who's stage managing and after initially appearing to dislike Grace starts to warm to her. Will Grace get the part and the boy?
+
|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.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847155146</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1510107789
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Benjamin J Myers
 
|title=The Grindle Witch
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=
 
''Deep in the woods something evil is stirring...''
 
 
 
You can say that again. Jack Jolly's father is a pathologist and neither he nor the armed police with him have ever seen anything like Tom Moore's body. Whoever or whatever killed the old man has carried out the most savage attack anyone has ever seen. And Jack, who has just moved to the remote village of Grindle from the city, had thought it a boring and dull place with unfriendly people, where nothing ever happens. How wrong could he have been?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444011715</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Holly Smale
 
|title=Geek Girl: All That Glitters
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=If you're a bright, enthusiastic teen but not top of the popularity polls at school then this series of books by Holly Smale is absolutely made for you. Harriet Manners is, according to your point of view, either beautiful enough to travel the world modelling fabulous clothes, or a girl with a very ordinary face who got very, very lucky. She's clumsy and accident-prone, her dress sense leaves a lot to be desired, and she's far more inclined to research the fine art of making friends in a book (or ten) than go out there and have a go.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007574584</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Michelle Falkoff
 
|title=Playlist For The Dead
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=This book markets itself as a mystery with a bit of a love story thrown in but it is more than that. It is about loss, anger, confusion, the pain caused by bullying and the desire to fit into a social group by connecting with other people. It addresses how people can change after a tragedy, the dangers of isolating oneself and how teens focus on pursuits such as gaming, science fiction, graphic novels, art, music and popular culture to express themselves and try to make sense of their world.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0008110662</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Lance Rubin
 
|title=Denton Little's Deathdate
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=
 
''Tomorrow is the day I'm going to die. I don't mean to get all dramatic about it. I've known that tomorrow is the day I will die since I was born.. Just like almost everyone else in the world knows their deathdate. But do I need to get movie-preview-voice-over-guy intense about it? Probably not.''
 
 
 
Oh! I think I would want to get intense about impending death. Don't you think you would, too? But imagine what it's like to live in a world where everyone knows the day they will die. Rituals and conventions spring up. You get to go to your own funeral. You could even get to make the most of your life if you know when it ends. You won't pass up so many opportunities, perhaps?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1471124231</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Tommy Wallach
+
|author= Jonathan Stroud
|title=We All Looked Up
+
|title= The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne
|rating=4.5
+
|rating= 4
|genre=Teens
+
|genre= Teens
|summary=
+
|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?
Peter, Eliza, Andy and Anita are all about to graduate high school. They all have plans and expectations, even slacker Andy. But those expectations are about to be thrown into disarray. An asteroid is approaching Earth and there's a 66% chance of a collision and an extinction level event. There are just a few weeks before a possible, no a likely, end of the world. What will happen? How will they react? What will they ''do''?
+
|isbn=1406394815
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147112455X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
Move on to [[Newest Thrillers Reviews]]
|author=Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner
 
|title=This Shattered World
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Stone-faced Captain Jubilee Chase is the best soldier on Avon, a planet in the midst of a rebellion, where the terraforming won’t take, and the mysterious Fury infects soldiers and turns them into mindless killers. Only Lee is immune, and she doesn’t understand why.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1423171039</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Elizabeth Wein
 
|title=Black Dove, White Raven
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=The essential role of aviators in the success or failure of modern war is a given, and fiction is full of the derring-do and dog-fight exploits of moustachioed heroes waving their trade-mark silk scarves as they land their frail and battered craft at a friendly airstrip. But what if the enemy planes outnumber those of your country by hundreds, if not thousands, and you, the pilot, are barely out of your childhood?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405271361</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Donald Hounam
 
|title=Gifted
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Fifteen-year-old Frank is a forensic sorcerer, employed to solve murders and other grisly crimes in a world where adults get the blur and lose their eyesight by their mid-twenties, and only the young have enough sorcerous power to summon demons and angels.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552571873</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Diana Sweeney
 
|title=The Minnow
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Diana Sweeney's ''The Minnow'' is an Australian book aimed at Young Adults that features death, grief, abuse, fear and loneliness. Teenage pregnancy lies at its heart while bereavement, and trying to come to terms with loss, bubbles just under the surface, constantly. But don't be misled. This novel isn't some earnest pedagogical attempt to convey teenage angst and elicit grave pity or understanding from the reader. What rescues it from mawkishness is the beautiful voice of the narrator, Tom (or Holly, if you prefer her real name). Tom doesn't fall prey to self-pity. She simply describes her world as she sees it, matter-of-fact. And the fact that her view is rather unusual (she talks to fish, dead people and her unborn child - and they talk back) doesn't really matter. Nothing can detract from the sheer lyricism of her voice. As a reader, you just have to suspend disbelief and enjoy the ride.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>192218201X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Lauren St John
 
|title=The Glory
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=Alex is what you might call a disruptive teenager. She's always getting into trouble but the latest trouble is the worst yet and her mum and step-dad have had enough. Even her father, far away in Australia with his new family, thinks something must be done. So Alex is sent all the way out to the States to a teenage boot camp. But even naughty teenagers have their plus points, and Alex's is her love of horses. She'll do anything to save the mustang scout from the slaughterhouse.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444012754</amazonuk>
 
}}
 

Latest revision as of 09:54, 8 July 2024

000862657X.jpg

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

0241645441.jpg

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

1471196585.jpg

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

0008666482.jpg

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

0008664730.jpg

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

1805140493.jpg

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

0571373801.jpg

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

1839944420.jpg

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

1526651793.jpg

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

1035003155.jpg

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

1919635017.jpg

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

1529509491.jpg

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

1800901232.jpg

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

1800901011.jpg

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

1406399590.jpg

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

1800900899.jpg

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

1789098130.jpg

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

1788452372.jpg

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

1510107789.jpg

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

1406394815.jpg

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

Move on to Newest Thrillers Reviews