Review: First Class Murder (A Murder Most Unladylike Mystery) by Robin Stevens

Daisy Wells and Hazel Wong are taking a holiday on the world-famous Orient Express - and it's clear that each of their fellow first-class passengers has something to hide. Even more intriguing: there is rumour of a spy in their midst.

Then, during dinner, there is a scream from inside one of the cabins. When the door is broken down, a passenger is found murdered, her stunning ruby necklace gone. But the killer has vanished - as if into thin air.

Daisy and Hazel are faced with their first ever locked-room mystery - and with competition from several other sleuths, who are just as determined to crack the case.

Historical mystery stories suddenly seem to be in vogue as far as middle grade children's books are concerned. In the past twelve months we have seen the publication of, amongst others, Jordan Stratford's The Case of the Missing Moonstone, Katherine Woodfine's The Mystery of the Clockwork Sparrow, Kevin Sands' The Blackthorn Key, and English translations of Irene Adler's Sherlock, Lupin and Me books. However, in my opinion, there is one person who is well ahead of the pack in the race to be crowned queen/king of kidlit mystery writing, and that is Robin Stevens.

Robin's Murder Most Unladylike, the first book in her Wells & Wong Mystery series, was one of my favourite books of 2014. The second book, Arsenic For Tea, made a very early bid for a 2015 top spot, and that has now been usurped by the third, and best in the series so far, First Class Murder. Robin Stevens doesn't just write outstanding mystery stories, her writing is among the very best for middle grade readers in the UK this year.

For this third book, Stevens has taken on her greatest challenge to date by setting her mystery on the Orient Express in 1935, only a year after the original release date of the great Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. However, the author has met this challenge with seemingly consummate ease, and has produced a mystery story that will keep young readers guessing until the dramatic denouement.

For many years, young fans of mystery stories had to make do with reading and re-reading the various mystery stories of Enid Blyton. However, the 'politically correct' brigade's claims of racism and sexism in Blyton's writing have sadly made these less appealing for parents to give to their children these days. Such claims can certainly not be levelled at the writing of Robin Stevens, who deals with the accepted, casual racism of that time with sensitivity, and whose female characters are intelligent, resilient and will never play second fiddle to any boy or man. In this third outing for the mystery solving pair, Stevens again does not shy away from touching on sensitive issues - in this case, the evil that was rising in Germany, and the plight of Jewish people in pre-WWII Europe with Hitler in power.

In Arsenic For Tea, we had the pleasure of meeting Daisy's family of eccentrics, and now the spotlight is on Hazel and her family, and more specifically her father. Vincent Wong, Director of Wong Banking, is a successful and driven man, yet this is 1930s Europe, and as such there are individuals who will look at him and assume he is a servant. However, whenever such incorrect assumptions are made he faces them with dignity and poise; it is easy to see where Hazel gets her inner strength from. He is also a man who wants the very best for his daughter, and in his mind the solving of mysteries is not a suitable pastime or occupation for any young lady, least alone his daughter. Thus Daisy's and Hazel's efforts to find the murderer are hampered even greater that usual by his vigilance and occasional interference. His presence leads to all kinds of subterfuge on the part of the girls, which in lesser hands could quite easily have descended into the world of slapstick. But hey, this is Robin Stevens we are talking about, so instead it not only adds humour to the story, but also adds to the tension we feel as readers.  

I desperately hope that Robin Stevens and her publisher have many more mysteries planned for Daisy Wells and Hazel Wong. If they do, then I predict that there will come a time when people no longer first think of Blyton when asked to name a children's mystery writer, instead it will be the name of Robin Stevens that is first on their lips. Move over Blyton, your long reign is over and there is a new queen of children's mystery stories!

Review: Arsenic For Tea (A Wells & Wong Mystery) by Robin Stevens

Schoolgirl detectives Daisy Wells and Hazel Wong are at Daisy's home, Fallingford, for the holidays. Daisy's glamorous mother is throwing a tea party for Daisy's birthday, and the whole family is invited, from eccentric Aunt Saskia to dashing Uncle Felix. But it soon becomes clear that this party isn't really about Daisy at all. Naturally, Daisy is furious.

Then one of their party falls seriously, mysteriously ill - and everything points to poison.

With wild storms preventing anyone from leaving, or the police from arriving, Fallingford suddenly feels like a very dangerous place to be. Not a single person present is what they seem - and everyone has a secret or two. And when someone very close to Daisy looks suspicious, the Detective Society must do everything they can to reveal the truth . . . no matter the consequences.

I loved Murder Most Unladylike, the first Wells & Wong book by Robin Stevens, so much so that it featured on my list of favourite books of 2014. And I know I'm not alone in this, as I saw it mentioned time after time when other reviewers were posting their Books of 2014 lists. I have been waiting rather impatiently for the release of the sequel, Arsenic for Tea, and it was well worth the wait. Not only is it a great sequel, but it is also a book that is even better then its predecessor.

In this second book Robin Stevens takes her pair of junior sleuths away from the confines Deepdeane, the private boarding school that was the setting for Murder Most Unladylike. Instead, the stage for this brilliant murder mystery story is Fallingford, a country mansion with obligatory sprawling grounds, and the cast a group of people with a plethora of eccentricities and foibles, most of whom just happen to be members of Daisy's family. For Fallingford is the Wells family home, and Daisy and Hazel are there for the holidays. This makes for the perfect setting for our story, and also makes it slightly more accessible than its predecessor in that there is much less use of boarding school slang that some less confident readers may have struggled with in Murder Most Unladylike. 

Daisy's fourteenth birthday is looming, and members of her family are gathering to celebrate, and what a family they are:

• Lord Hastings (Daisy's father). Disorganised, forgetful, but full of humour and loves to play practical jokes on his daughter. Much to the disdain of:
• Lady Hastings (Daisy's mother). Glamorous, snooty, vain, conceited, and possibly adulterous. If she wasn't Daisy's mother we might be wishing her to be the one to fall foul of our mystery murderer.
• Uncle Felix. Daisy's favourite uncle who just might work for the police in London in some manner or other.
• Aunt Saskia. Let's just say, don't leave your silverware lying around when Aunt Saskia's in the house ;-)
• Bertie. Daisy's exceedingly grumpy older brother.

That's the family, but then there are all kinds of others in Fallingford: Miss Alston, the girls' frumpy but enigmatic governess; the various staff of Fallingford; Stephen, Bertie's friend from school; and finally, Denis Curtis, a 'friend' of Lasy Hastings, and a complete and utter cad.

In Arsenic For Tea, Robin Stevens gives us a much deeper look at the character of Daisy Wells. As with most kids who are domineering and brash, there is a very good reason for it, and in Daisy's case it is to hide a girl whose family life is not quite as perfect as she would have anyone on the outside expect. There are obvious tensions between the jocular Lord Hastings and his overbearing and far more glamorous wife, and it is repeatedly suggested that Lady Hastings has a habit of straying from the marital path. However, although this is obvious to all and sundry, Daisy acts as if everything is perfect in her life. In addition, Falligford has obviously seen better days, and therefore funds are not as plentiful as they may have been in the past.

And then there is Hazel, Daisy Wells's very own Watson. Hazel could so easily be the quiet little mouse who acquiesces to every single demand her pushy friend throws at her, but as we saw in Murder Most Unladylike, Hazel is much more than just a hanger on in the Detective Society. It is easy to forget that back in the 1930s, multicultural Britain did not exist as it does today, and casual (and more overt) racism was rife (this being one of the main criticisms of Enid Blyton's work in this modern age), especially amongst the upper classes. Just as Hazel feels like she is fitting in, she is reminded that she is different to those around her. We might expect it from the undiplomatic Aunt Saskia: "there seems to be an ORIENTAL in your hall" she proclaims as she meets Hazel for the first time, but even the lovely Lord Hastings can't help it: "How are you? Who are you? You don't look like Daisy's friends usually do. Are you English?" Somehow Daisy seems to be able to rise above this and there are moments when, observing the tatty state of Fallingford and its relatively meagre compliment of staff, that Hazel realises how much better off her family is, back in Hong Kong.

Arsenic For Tea can be read as a standalone mystery but I would implore you to start with Murder Most Unladylike if for some unfathomable reason you or your children have not yet stumbled across the Wells and Wong Mysteries, as there are several mentions of the previous mystery in this book (although not enough to spoil the plot of MMU). We are in for a real treat this year, as there is another Wells & Wong Mystery scheduled to be published in July of this year. Titled First Class Murder, it's only blimmin' set on the ORIENT EXPRESS! I can't wait!

Arsenic For Tea is due to be published on 29th January and my thanks go to the wonderful Harriet Venn at Random House for sending me a copy to read. You can read more about Robin Stevens and her books at http://robin-stevens.co.uk/

Review: ACID by Emma Pass

2113. In Jenna Strong's world, ACID - the most brutal, controlling police force in history - rule supreme. No throwaway comment or muttered dissent goes unnoticed - or unpunished. And it was ACID agents who locked Jenna away for life, for a bloody crime she struggles to remember.

The only female inmate in a violent high-security prison, Jenna has learned to survive by any means necessary. And when a mysterious rebel group breaks her out, she must use her strength, speed and skill to stay one step ahead of ACID - and to uncover the truth about what really happened on that dark night two years ago.

When I first saw mention of ACID on Twitter back in 2012 I stifled a small yawn, and thought great, just what the world needs, another dystopian YA story. And then I saw Lauren Buckland, one of the top editors at Random House (and someone I rate very highly based on the books she has edited) raving about it, and I started to think that perhaps I might give it a try. Then, when the cover image was unveiled the shallow part of me thought wow - love the cover, I will definitely read that book. And now? Whenever I read another YA dystopian story I will measure it against ACID. Yes, I loved it that much (yes, even more than The Hunger Games).

ACID is set one hundred years in the future, in a Britain that has become a 1984-style authoritarian police state known as the Independent Republic of Britain (IRB), said police being ACID (Agency for Crime Investigation and Defence). The people at the top, no longer elected officials, have cut the IRB off from the rest of the world, and its residents no longer have access to the internet or any form of international news. Personal freedoms are as close to zero as you can get: no marriage/choice of partner - instead there is life-partnering where your LifePartner is chosen for you by the state, or also dictate whether you can have children or not. And like any such regime that has occurred in 'real life' (I'm thinking USSR, North Korea, China), there is a very small minority of people with a huge majority of the wealth, whilst the masses live in poverty and near starvation. London has become a divided city, literally, with areas designated Upper (for the elite), then Middle, and then finally Outer, which is a pretty grim place to live and work, and where you can be arrested for not having the news-feed (i.e. propaganda) screens on for the majority of the time you are at home.

In the middle of all this authoritarian nastiness we meet Jenna, a seventeen year-old girl serving a life sentence in a prison full of men. Jenna was convicted of murdering her parents two years previously, and in that time she has had to become the veritable definition of badass in order to survive. Resigned to a lifetime of incarceration, Jenna is as surprised as anyone when she is broken out of jail by a group of mysterious rebels. This escape becomes the start of a dangerous journey as Jenna begins to question everything she knows, or thinks she knows, about herself, her background and the IRB itself.

I loved everything about this book. Jenna is a superb character, and it is so refreshing to have a female lead who is strong on the outside and the inside, and doesn't spend half the book mooning over the male lead, or stuck in the middle of a teen love triangle. Jenna is the Lara Croft of dystopian YA: independent, fierce, resourceful and seriously, seriously kick-ass. I also loved the all-too-believable future Britain that Emma Pass has crafted. Yes, there are one or two elements that stretch plausibility almost to its limits, but long-time readers of this blog will know that I read to escape, and suspension of disbelief is second nature to me. In fact, I would suggest anyone who struggles with this should stick to reading biographies.

If you like your stories fast and furious then ACID should move right to the top of your must-read list. Emma Pass has managed to fit more action scenes into her story than you will find in many a big budget action film, and yet the pace does not leave you gasping for air as she has this completely under control, giving us just enough plateaus to get our breath back before the action kicks in again.

ACID reads perfectly as a standalone novel, and for once I was really happy about this as I felt that this story needed to be brought to a satisfying conclusion, without any form of cliffhanger leaving us waiting for a sequel. The final chapter has the barest of hints that we may be treated to another Jenna Strong in the future, and I would certainly read it, but I would be just as happy reading anything in this kind of vein if Emma Pass is writing it, and it looks as we will have the opportunity to do just that, with the publication of The Fearless in 2014.

ACID was published on 25th April and thanks go to the ever wonderful people at Random House for sending me a copy. Go out and get your hands on one now - this is one of those books that I will be forcing into people's hands for some time to come.

Review: Special Ops - Dead Or Alive by Craig Simpson (Special Ops Book 4)

A rogue British agent has vanished with a suitcase full of cash and a head full of secrets. Have Britain's defences been exposed? Special Operations must act fast. Finn Gunnersen and fellow agents head for the dark and sinister streets of Nazi-occupied Paris. Their orders are simple: Bring the agent back - Dead or Alive.

Fact: Many boys love books about war. If my own experiences as a teacher are not evidence enough of this then I have a little more for you. First up, my good friend Liz from the My Favourite Books blog has made several school visits in recent years, talking to kids about books, and she told me that one of the boys' favourite subjects is war. Add to this the continuing popularity of Commando Comic. Following a recent visit to the National Army Museum, where I discovered an exhibition of art from the comic, I became intrigued as to how many people still read Commando. The information from the publisher's website shows that 34% of the readers of Commando Comic are under 25, and the comic has a readership of approximately 40,000, with 8 issues being published each month. Ergo, boys love war stories - and yet there are still only a small handful of books being published each year that fall into this genre, my favourite of which are the Special Ops books by Craig Simpson.

Back in 2010 I posted a review that covered all three of the Special Ops books that had been released up to that point. I discovered the series after the publication of the third book, Wolf Squadron, and had the luxury of being able to read the three almost back-to-back. I found them more enjoyable, and certainly more believable, than the likes of the CHERUB books as the stories are grounded in fact - young people did play a huge part in the resistance movements of the various occupied contries during WWII, and all Craig Simpson has done is take this a step further by having a trio of Norwegian teenagers drafted in to work for S.O.E., the very real intelligence organisation that was set up to fight back against the Nazis.

Now, after an 18 month wait, the fourth book in the series, Dead or Alive, is out and is yet another thrilling addition to the series. I would like to say that Dead or Alive is more of the same from Craig Simpson, but that sounds like I am being negative. Far from it - in this case, more of the same means it is just as brilliant has his previous three books in the series. It has all the ingredients that have made this such an exciting series to read - great characters putting their lives on the line for the greater good, tight plotting, great action scenes, realistic dialogue and as much tension as any best-selling adult thriller.

Importantly, in these books Craig Simpson never glorifies the role these young people play in the war. Yes, they find themselves having to carry guns, and occasionally having to kill others in order to survive, but they never seem wholly comfortable with these extreme actions, however necessary they were. This is possibly more apparent in Dead or Alive than in the previous ones, as this time they are sent over to France to locate a fellow agent oy may, or may not have turned traitor. Said agent has gone missing with a headful of secrets vital to the defense of England fortune in funds that were supposed to aid the Resistance. Finn, Loki and Freya are instructed to seek and if necessary destroy this agent, and this is something that does not sit well with them from the very start. Should they follow their orders to the letter? What if he turns out to be innocent and by shooting first and asking later they end up killing an innocent man? What are the consequences if they fail to carry out the orders that come from Churchill himself?

I hope that these books are selling well as I would love Craig Simpson to be able to continue writing about his trio of youg heroes. The events of Dead or Alive take place in November 1941, so there is plenty more wartime remaining for him to set his stories in. If you are/have a 10+ boy who loves action thrillers then these books come highly recommended. Not only will yuo/he be able to enjoy a fast-paced exciting story, but there is also a history lesson with it. At the end of each book the author includes a postscript, explaining which elements of the story are based on fact (in this case, an agent really did go missing with a suitvase full of bank notes).

My thanks go the the generous people at Corgi Books for sending me a copy of Dead or Alive to review. Please watch this space as I hope to feature a gust post by Craig Simpson sometime in the near future.

Review: Monster republic - The Judas Code by Ben Horton

The explosion at the Prime Minister's visit to Long Harbour means the cover of the Monster Republic is blown, and they are forced deep into hiding. Lazarus Fry turns his tactics to infiltration, and is confident of their swift crushing. Plus his new pets, the Blood Hawks, are hungry to get their talons into some fresh kill...   But Fry hasn't counted on this band of rebel kids' awesome will for survival. When your back is against the wall, the only option is to come out fighting...

It really doesn't seem like twelve months since I read and reviewed Monster Republic, the first book in Ben Horton's series about a gang of children who have been experimented on by an evil scientist and lived to tell the tale. That first book was very much the story of Cameron, a boy caught up in a massive explosion who awakes to find that he has been worked on by the evil Lazarus Fry. Thanks to the explosion he is now severely disfigured, a tragedy that isn't even slightly improved in his mind by the fact that he has also been  given various bionic enhancements. That book detailed his escape from Fry's compound, and his discovery that he is not alone as he is taken under the wing of other experimentees, who have christened themselves the Monster Republic.

Cameron's character is still a key element of The Judas Code, which follows straight on from the events at the end of its predecessor. However, this story has a broadened focus in that the plot is now just as much about the group and their attempts to stay alive and hidden from the armed forces that are amassing in Broad Harbour and its surrounding area. Of course, there are still elements within the Republic who resent Cameron's presence, and do not yet trust him, fearing that his headstrong nature and desire for revenge may lead to disaster for them all. And maybe they they are right........


Just two books into the series and a reader will already know what to expect from Ben Horton. These are not books that are going to win prizes for the complexity of the plotting, or thorough and detailed character development. However, if there was an award going for pace and non-stop action then he would surely have a chance of being on the shortlist. That's not to say that the characters aren't good - with their various enhancements these monster children make for great reading fun, and I know many boys who really enjoyed the first book in the series because of Ben Horton's imaginative creations. The Judas Code helps us to get to know these damaged kids much better, and he really has fun  describing some of them (I think my favourite is the aptly named Crawler).


This is a great book for both struggling and reluctant readers, as the relatively large print and shortish chapters will appeal and the fast pace will help draw them into the story very quickly. At a push this book could be read as a standalone as the author seems to have gone out of his way to fill us in on the events that happened in the first book. This will certainly appeal to many reluctant reader boys who, if they see a book they like, want to read it there and then instead of having to faff around waiting for the first in the series to drop into their hands. However, the more discerning boy reader should really read book one first to get the most out of this sci-fi action series. The Judas Code was published on 6th January and my thanks go to the generous people at RHCB for sending me a copy to review. Watch this space for a chance to win a copy of the book in a few days time.

Review: Special Operations series by Craig Simpson

At the beginning of the summer I was asked by the people at Corgi books if I would like to receive a copy of Wolf Squadron, the third books in Craig Simpson's Special Operations series. It was with a little embarrassment that I had to admit that I had not yet read either of the first two books in the series, and within days the generous people at Corgi had sent me the full set to review. As I already had a huge To Be Read pile I spaced these books out over the summer, although after reading the first one I was sorely tempted to read them all in one go. These books are brilliant and I wish I had discovered them sooner. We have all three in the school library but I had never picked one up, and it makes me wonder how many other great books are out there that I have missed out on due to lack of time.

The Special Operations series is set during World War II, not an era that has been particularly fashionable in kids and YA literature in recent years, but with these books Craig Simpson should be the man to change that. "What about Robert Muchamore's Henderson Boys series?" I hear you ask. Whilst I enjoyed those, in my opinion these are even better than the Henderson Boys.

The Special Operations books follow the adventures of three 16-year old Norwegians - Finn Gunnersen, Loki Larson and Freya Haukelid - who have been recruited by the historically factual Special Operations Executive (S.O.E.), an Top Secret organisation that was created in the fight against the Nazis during World War II. This isn't like CHERUB, H.I.V.E. or any of those other organisations using young people such as in the Alex Rider books -  S.O.E. really existed and young people actually played an important part in the resistance movements of many of the occupied countries in Europe at that time. My knowledge of this era is not great so I do not know whether or not S.O.E. actually used agents as young as 16, but the WWII setting instantly makes these stories far more believable than any of those others I just mentioned. The reality aspect of the stories is also helped by the fact that the group's adventures are all based on real life events from this period, which Craig Simpson gives further details about in the postscript in each of the books.

There have been three books released so far on this series: Dogfight, Death Ray and Wolf Squadron.

Dogfight:

Finn Gunnersen and his best friend, Loki, are mad about planes. Finn wants to follow in the footsteps of his father and become a pilot. But with the Second World War raging on and German soldiers invading his Norwegian village, flying isn't the only thing on his mind. The Resistance movement is making plans to reveal top-secret information to the British, and Finn and Loki are desperate to lend a hand. But, talking about risking your lives and actually doing it are two different things. Courage and determination takes them beyond Norwegian shores for more action-packed, full-throttle adventures. So get ready for take-off!

Death Ray:

Finn Gunnersen and his friends Loki and Freya have been recruited by the enigmatic 'X' as special agents, working for the Allies. Acting on information from the French resistance they are dispatched on Operation Death Ray to aid in the sabotage of vital German technology. But with suspected double agents in their midst and their loved ones held by the Gestapo, it's not just their own lives at risk if they fail...In a world at war, everyone has their part to play.

Wolf Squadron:

Finn Gunnersen and his friends Loki and Freya are behind enemy lines once more and at the heart of a dangerous Special Ops mission. A mole has struck at the heart of HQ and is jeopardizing the entire resistance network in Holland. Meanwhile Finn's charged with providing a escort for a British Double agent in possession of critical Nazi invasion plans but with his father missing in action, he has a personal score to settle with the enemy...

As I have already mentioned, I think these books are brilliant and boys of 11+ will love them. Younger boys who are confident readers will also find them hugely enjoyable, but sometimes the content may be a little violent for them. The events of the time period the books are set in have given the author a great starting point for his books, and as a talented author he has so far created three tightly plotted stories that twist and turn throughout. This was a time when your best friend or neighbour could easily turn out to be a Nazi collaborator and you had to be careful about who you trusted, and saying the wrong thing to the wrong person could find you and your friends and family facing a firing squad. The Nazis did not look sympathetically on members of the resistance or British spies, and so the tension levels in these books are almost unbearable at times - cliched though the concept is, these books are very difficult to put down.

Craig Simpson has also created a very believable cast of characters, both primary and secondary. The three Norwegian teenagers each have their own reasons for putting their lives on the line for S.O.E., although for all three of them the main driving motivation is to see the Nazis expelled from Europe so they can return to a free Norway. However, it is their individual reasons for fighting that often cause the team problems, especially where Finn is concerned as he still grieves for his father who left Norway at the start of the war and went down in battle whilst flying a Spitfire for the Allies. Loki and Freya are also something of an item, and as such the decisions that Loki makes in some scenes are not always for the good of the mission - he is after all a teenager and emotions play an important part in the actions of him and his friends.

If you enjoy fast-paced thrillers with great characters then these really are the books for you. The agents of the Special Operations Executive played a huge part throughout the whole of the war, and were key players in the D-Day landings in 1944. Wolf Squadron takes place in the summer of 1941, so Craig Simpson has plenty of time and events that he can use to write more books in the series - it would be great to see Finn, Loki and Freya take part in the Allied invasion that became a turning point of the whole war. If you are interested in finding out more about Craig, his books and the real life Special Operations Executive then his website is well worth a visit.

Review: Monster Republic by Ben Horton

An explosion in a nuclear power plant. Kids patched up with scavenged body parts and bionic implants. A growing army of superhuman soldiers programmed for destruction. Cameron Riley is about to discover that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger...

Firstly.... great title!
Secondly...  great cover art!
Thirdly (and most importantly)... great story!

As a result of the Harry Potter phenomenon, over the last ten years the kids and YA market has been swamped with fantasy books (both good and bad). Similarly, the success of Anthony Horowitz's Alex Rider books led to a glut of teen boy action heroes. On the basis of some of the books I have read lately I think that a) 2010 is going to be a great year for YA/kids horror and b) we really need more science fiction books released for these age groups. Joe Craig and Keith Mansfield have both written great science fiction stories over the past few years, and now Ben Horton wants a piece of the action. And if Monster Republic, the first in a new series, is anything to go by then I think Mr Horton will be here to stay.

The publishers of Monster Republic have billed it as The Terminator meets X-Men and they are not far off with that comparison. Mix in a massive dollop of The Six Million Dollar Man (if you are of an age where you have no idea what I am talking about - ask your parents) and you have this: a fast paced sci-fi actioner with great characters and a storyline that is begging to be reproduced on the big screen. And the action is there almost from the start; there is no hanging around whilst scenes are set in this book. We have a slightly creepy Prologue, Chapter 1 to introduce us to Cameron, the main character, and his normal, everyday school friends (and one school fiend), and then BOOM!..... life for Cameron will never be the same again. The remaining 261 pages with their larger than average typeface do not leave much room for faffing around - once the action starts it hardly lets up until the final page.

When reviewing the first book in a series I rarely expect full character development. After all, if a new character is introduced in a soap opera you don't expect to find out everything that makes them tick within that first episode. I would suggest, though, that Ben Horton manages to develop Cameron's character pretty well, aided and abetted by the plot - Cameron is thrown into situation after situation where he has to come to terms with what has happened to him; the reaction of other people to him; the lack of trust shown towards him by other victims of human medical experimentation gone wild; and so on, and so on. The personalities and motivations of many of the secondary characters are still something of a mystery to us as the action mainly focuses on Cameron, but I expect we will see these developed in future books.

This really is movie blockbuster material and it is the sort of book that this blog was born to promote. The last five pages even present us with some glorious black and white graphic novel style images... perfect for boys who struggle with picturing images from the words they read, although I am not sure they will have much trouble conjuring up images of Cameron's manufactured appearance. Mr Horton does not give us lengthy passages of descriptive writing when it comes to Cameron and the other 'creations' of Dr Lazarus Fry.... again, he lets the action do the talking and if it weren't for these graphic novel images I would imagaine that every reader would formulate a different mental image of what Cameron looks like.

Monster Republic is aimed at the 12+ market. It is published by Corgi and is in stores right now. My thanks go out to the kind people at RHCB who sent me this copy to review.

** Guest Review - Crawlers by Sam Enthoven

Ben is on a school trip. So is Jasmine. What they don't know is that not everybody in the theatre is there to watch the play and, in fact, they'll never get to see it ...There is panic at the Barbican when the fire alarms start wailing, but the strangely silent theatre staff, trap them inside the building rather than letting them out to safety. Ben, Jasmine and their classmates soon discover that there's no fire - what's happening is much weirder, and much scarier. Strange spider-like creatures swarm through the building attacking people and turning them into vicious killers, and the kids have to run for their lives. But barricaded in an office, with these creatures waiting outside for them, the children realise they're stuck. Will they ever get out? And, more importantly can they trust each other?

Fact One: Sam Enthoven is a good writer.
Fact Two: Sam Enthoven is a deeply weird and disturbed person.
Fact Three: We love him for it.

Who else could possibly conceive a nightmare so bloody awful and real that I still feel a bit twitchy between my shoulder blades when I think about Crawlers, Sam’s newest offering to his adoring fans.

If you’re someone easily frightened then trust me when I hand you this warning: WALK AWAY, DO NOT READ THIS FOR FEAR OF NIGHTMARES.

But if you’re a fan of critters that go bump in the night, things that creep and crawl, then read on!

I find with Sam’s writing that it’s all very real, as you can tell from my shoutiness above. When I realised where the setting was going to be – The Barbican, one of London’s ugliest buildings – I had to laugh because I’ve attended a show there myself and I know what a strange and ugly place it is, so I could sympathise with the characters for being forced to go there to attend a theatre production.

Crawlers is written from three perspectives: firstly, we meet the Queen who has been held captive by a very old London company for their own nefarious purposes. She’s a very intelligent creepy being who has been biding her time, waiting for someone to give her the chance to show off her skills for infiltration and deviousness.

Then we meet Ben and Jasmine respectively. Ben attends Walsingham School for Boys, an exclusive private school but Ben’s not quite comfortable there. He’s into movies and superheroes and is a bit of a dreamer. Jasmine on the other hand is from Swatham Academy for Girls and it’s not quite as nice. Jasmine’s intelligent and good with maths and science – she works hard on her grades because she wants to make something of herself. This has her appear a bit aloof from others and she’s ridiculed for it.

When chaos erupts at The Barbican, with the release of the crawlers (small insect crittery things that attach themselves to the back of the neck of their human hosts) Ben and Jasmine (who’ve merely seen one another in passing) manage to keep their calm and get their respective school mates to the relative safety of the security room.

Mix a group of upper-class boys, a handful of girls who are out looking for trouble, in a small confined space, dash in some critters intent on taking over the human population who share a hive-mind, and watch what happens.

It’s tense and intelligent. A good exploration of the various strengths and weaknesses characters display in a bad situation. Usual actioners have very little time for character development but in Crawlers Mr. E has managed to convey a good sense of who his characters are and what they’re about. You can see their progression throughout the novel and it’s gratifying to see how one of the weaker boys, stands up and fights not just for himself but for everyone else and how that affects him and those around him. Clever writing indeed.

The novel takes place from 6pm to just before midnight on the same day. A lot happens. It’s breathtaking and scary and it freaked me out quite a bit. It’s also cinematic and you can tell that the author’s had a great time plumbing the depths of his own imagination on how to make tense situations even more tense and over the top.

The ending is wow and the finale is ... waitaminute, did I just feel something crawl up my leg!?

~~~

A huge thank you to Liz de Jager from My Favourite Books for this fantastic review. As I said recently, if you haven't discovered Liz's blog yet then you really should head on over there as she is also a big fan of YA and children's books, many of which are boy friendly. I read Crawlers myself last week and I feel that Liz's review really does it justice; it is a fantastic horror story with a wonderfully grotesque cover (the kids at school were totally grossed out by it). Crawlers is due to be published by Corgi on 1st April 2010. Sam Enthoven has kindly offered to take part in an interview for this blog so watch this space - maybe we will find out a little more about his twisted imagination. If you have any questions you would like me to ask him then please leave them as comments by 29th January.