Street Duty: Knock Down by Chris Ould

A 14 year-old female is left unconscious after she gets run over, leaving several unanswered questions: Why didn't she see the lorry? Why was she running? Why was she barefoot? At the hospital the staff start to suspect that she may have been sexually assaulted. Trainee Police Officer Holly Blades is determined to find out the truth and bring someone to justice. The Trainee Police Officer programme aims to help the police engage with younger members of the community by enabling those who are 16 years-old and who show a certain level of aptitude to enrol as officers on a fast track route to joining the service. Not everyone is  convinced by the scheme and so for Holly to succeed in her quest she must put together the pieces of the case whilst overcoming the negativity and scepticism of those above her. 


The way this novel is put together works really well. I found that I thought I'd figured out how this novel would fit together and then was pleasantly surprised to see that I wasn't quite right. The extra plot threads that aren't tied up work well as they help to give the novel a more realistic feel instead of that happily ever after feel that novels often have when everything is tied up neatly or when they're not written for adults. The details Ould provides about the police, such as the phrases used during radio contact, also help to create a feel of realism. It's clear that he's done his research and has a real feel for what he is writing about. The novel is very easy to read and  the chapters are a comfortable length. The explicit language is only used when it helps to create the characters using it and not just for the sake of it like some other novels I have read. The characters are realistic and for a teen novel this book is a breath of fresh air as there is no love interest involving the main character. My only criticism with the characters is that there isn't much depth to the main ones as you only find out surface details, but perhaps this is something that will be built on in future novels. The content is more suitable for older readers but again this is used well and attempts to bring some of the realities of youth crime into teenage writing without being sensationalist but without attempting to mollycoddle the reader either. 


Overall I enjoyed this book and look forward to reading future instalments in the series. It's great to have a crime novel that is written specifically for teenagers especially as the closest novel I can think of is The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson but that still contains a fantasy element and so isn't really a crime novel.


I give it 7/10 :)


Title: Street Duty: Knock Down
Author: Chris Ould
Publisher: Usborne
Teenage Fiction (15+ as recommended by Usborne due to explicit language and content)

Witch Crag by Kate Cann

Kita has grown up in a tribe of sheepmen whose only priority is to survive, sacrificing pleasure and having very traditional roles for both men and women that no-one disobeys. Kita desires freedom, to be able to see the outside world and not be penned in a cage looking after the little ones. Together with Quainy and Rath, she plans her escape which will take her through lands filled with terrifying creatures and dangerous people as they seek the uncertain safety of the nightmarish Witch Crag. But even if they make it into the tribe of the witches, will they be safe from their past and the war that threatens to destroy all that the various tribes have worked for?

The setting of a society with such traditional roles for men and women set in a future after a terrible event (called the Great Havoc) caught my attention as the other dystopian novels don't usually come across as being so strong in these roles and so I was curious to see how it would be done. It also promised the usual enemy becoming the true love which can sometimes add a good bit of drama. However, I found that Witch Crag didn't really deliver all that it promised. You never find out what the Great Havoc was and the whole plot felt very rushed which prevented either of the main plot promises from truly being developed. You never really got a feel for the world as the characters would be dropped into one event and then suddenly be experiencing another. Even the journey through the forest which started out so well, being nicely descriptive, soon gave way to the need to speed onto the next crisis. The relationships aren't very realistic either because of the pace - the characters trust and fall in love too easily, as well as lacking depth. The "enemy" isn't really ever a true enemy of Kita's and her romance isn't very detailed or long and occurs very suddenly.When a crisis occurs it happens very quickly and then the characters are extracted very conveniently and speedily, which just felt very unsatisfying and unrealistic. I also expected the book to end slightly further on from where it did and it almost felt like Cann just ran out of time and quickly brought things to a close. I think the idea for this book had great potential but might have been better served by being split into two books to allow for a good quantity of world building or sticking to one theme instead of trying to cover dystopia, adventure and the supernatural/fantasy as it all feels a bit forced and none are fully developed to a satisfying degree. On the plus side, it is nice to read a book that appears to be a standalone for a change as the teen market is saturated with so many series that I find it difficult to remember which ones I'm reading and what has happened in each one. 


Overall, if you're looking for a novel that will stand on its own with a dystopian flavour then this one will do just that. But if you're looking for something to fill the Hunger Games void in your life then you might want to try some of the other brilliant novels out there, such as Pure by Julianna Baggott, Divergent by Veronica Roth or Gone by Michael Grant.


I give it 6/10.


Title: Witch Crag
Author: Kate Cann
Publisher: Scholastic
Teenage Fiction


(Due to be published October 2012)

Pure by Julianna Baggott

Pressia Belze has been fighting for survival in a nightmare world wrecked by detonations for several years, along with others who have become fused to that which was closest to them when the white light came (known as the Wretches). She dreams about life from Before, a life that lies within the safety of the Dome. Partridge is a Pure, an undamaged and whole human, who has been inside the Dome ever since the detonations. But life inside the Dome isn't like the world that Pressia dreams of. It is strictly controlled by the leaders, and even history has become blurred and forgotten. When Partridge starts to suspect that he has been lied to for all these years he decides to go on a journey to find the truth, a journey that will take him into the strange and dangerous world outside of the precious safety of the Dome. Inevitably his path crosses with Pressia's, a meeting which will make both of their lives unrecognisable.

If you've read any other dystopian young adult fiction, then you'll have a good idea of the style and quality of writing that dominates this genre (most of the ones I've come across have all been equally good, this one included). What sets this one apart is that it doesn't just give you events from one or two of the characters, it gives you narration from at least four. Instead of the typical one girl falling for two guys you get a group of characters, all finding one another, joining together to survive and hold on to that which they hold most dear, each playing their own vital role. This gives Pure a unique feel as you get a real sense of this community spirit that is beginning form. It has the standard ruling class suppressing the lower ones, with a hidden rebellion forming underneath the surface, but in Pure you get a real taste for the web of control the leaders have and a feel for the fear that exists in this world. The story is compelling and exciting. The characters and the world are vivid and convincing. I'm looking forward to reading the sequel and hope that Baggott continues to use these unique elements of her plot to great effect.

I also love the paperback cover! It's incredibly eye-catching and striking. The flame effect works superbly on the black (although I think Pure could stand alone without the reference to The Hunger Games, particularly as every other dystopian novel seems to be trying to make this claim).

I give it 8/10 :)

Title: Pure
Author: Julianna Baggott
Publisher: Headline
Teenage Fiction

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

September is a twelve year-old girl who would love to go on an adventure. Luckily, she gets the chance when the Green Wind appears along with the Leopard of Little Breezes and shows her the way into Fairyland. She soon discovers that all is not well as the much-disliked Marquess (a brilliantly unlikeable character) has taken charge and attempted to bend Fairyland and all who live there to her will. After stumbling across some witches, September embarks on a quest to retrieve a stolen spoon, but soon finds herself caught up in an even greater adventure than she dared to hope. 

I decided to read this book after several of my fellow booksellers were excitedly proclaiming how much they had fallen in love with it and so I ordered a copy based solely on their enthusiasm. When it arrived and I saw the cover I knew that it was the sort of book that I used to long for when I was younger: one that would let me escape and take me away into another world. The title could have simply been "September" as this is exactly who it is about, but "The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making" suits the story so much better (as well as being the best title for a book that I have ever come across). The illustrations provide a brilliant glimpse of certain parts of this tale (although they are a little creepy at times). There are even little summaries at the beginning of each chapter to give you a teasing taste of what is to come. It certainly set itself up to be a unique adventure,

Now, I am one of those people who can quite happily sit for hours devouring a book, and in fact love it when this happens as I get to feel like I have truly escaped reality just for a short while and gone on an exciting adventure. When I started to read this book, I really thought it would be another one I couldn't put down as it definitely appeared to have all of the right ingredients. However, I'd start reading and then suddenly realise that I was checking Facebook on my phone or doing some chore that had suddenly popped into my head. This wasn't because I wasn't enjoying the book and so this left me feeling slightly confused. I think that possibly the ease in which you can enter Fairyland through September, along with the nice complete chapters (one's that don't end in a way that makes you desperate to read on thanks to cliffhanger style endings) and the lack of identifying with September personally, all made it very easy to put the book down. This meant that I had to make a little bit more of an effort to complete the book, but this effort was worth it. I did still get to feel like I had escaped to Fairyland as Valente's world is nicely described and easy to picture. The characters were also very real feeling (or perhaps I have a vivid imagination!) and so were very effective in their roles of being warm and loving or bitter and intimidating. The writing style is different to most young adult writing that I've come across and this instantly gives the books Narnian feel (in fact, I frequently thought of Narnia whilst reading it and even Valente herself makes a reference to Narnia through Not/Nor who tells September that there's more than one way between her world and Fairyland, including "those that stumble through... a wardrobe full of winter coats"). However, it's definitely a tale for those who are slightly older as Valente successfully makes my favourite season seem sinister and doesn't shy away from the gruesome detail of gutting your first fish without proper instruction or the real consequences of being pushed down a deep, mostly-dry well (in other tales September might have had her fall cushioned by leaves so as not to come to harm).

If I were to make a criticism it would be some of the choices of words as there were frequently ones that I had no idea what the meaning was, even though I'm grown up and supposed to know such things, but this is really the only criticism I can make. Even with my initial difficulties with staying focused on this book I still found myself being carried away on the adventure and fell in love with the story and characters by the end (just as those before me have done). I cannot wait to read the sequel as Valente manages to give you another tantalising taste of what is to come without giving too much away. I definitely recommend this to anyone who has ever looked for Narnia in the back of their wardrobe, even if you're supposed to be a grown-up.

I give it 8/10 :)

P.S. I absolutely love the Wyverary! Such a brilliant idea for a character!

Title: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making
Author: Catherynne M. Valente
Publisher: Corsair
Teenage Fiction

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

Celaena Sardothien is an 18 year old assassin, possibly the best her world has ever seen. Yet she made one mistake and got caught which led to her being imprisoned in a death camp. Half-starved and beaten, she has an unexpected visitor. The king has chosen to hold a contest to find someone mighty enough to be his champion, and so all of the leading nobles must choose a person to compete. Celaena is the choice of the crown prince, despite the reservations of those around him. Given a chance to earn her freedom, something she longs for more than anything else, Celaena agrees to go with the prince and live in the castle to train and hopefully make it through to the final round. Whilst there, she discovers a hidden darkness along with a taste of romance, a hint of the past and a terrifying power.

One of the first things that struck me about this book was the fantasy feel. It's in the style of writing as well as some of the strange names. The names themselves took a bit of getting used to as it's not necessarily clear how to pronounce them. It's also a little weird that Celaena is often referred to as "the assassin" quite a bit, even after she's been properly introduced. As this seems to decrease the further you get into the book, it has the effect of helping you feel like you're becoming more and more familiar with Celaena, which I'm guessing may have been the author's intention. A little bit further in, I experienced a sense of deja vu as I felt the beginning of a predictable plot and romance. Thankfully this turned out not to be the case. There are some elements of the plot that come as no surprise but the journey makes them fit well, plus it's not quite as predictable as it first seems. The world is believable and it was easy to picture the surroundings from Celaena's experiences. The romance element is nicely balanced with the rest of the story and, unusually, doesn't come mainly from our female lead. It also keeps you guessing and by the end you're still not sure which path it's going to take. The contest itself doesn't receive as much coverage as I would have expected and it might have been nice to have had a bit more detail. This is something I also felt about our brilliant assassin as she doesn't really do many assassin-like things and spends a lot of time being a girly girl with some angry thoughts. However, there is excellent potential for this character as she's definitely deadly and will have some tough choices to make in the future. The bad guys are also nicely dark and scheming and so I am looking forward to finding out what happens next. It also had that slightly addictive quality that meant I struggled to put it down and looked forward to the moments when I could pick it up again. It was an enjoyable read and is great for those who love a bit of fantasy with a strong female lead.

Overall, the best thing about this book is that it contains all the good ingredients of a brilliant fantasy but with an excellent twist in the assassin that just gives it that hint of something a little bit different.

I give it 8/10 :)

Title: Throne of Glass
Author: Sarah Maas
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Teenage Fiction