Books

    Trapped
       by Michael Northrop

Scotty is your standard teenage boy, with friends, family and the usual set of problems. What he didn't expect to have as a problem though was being stuck in school, with no help, no heat, no food, no water for a week in the middle of a snowstorm. This is teenage social structure condensed, told through the eyes of a boy. This is where the novel is interesting. There's not a lot of decent, truthful, non-sci-fi YA fiction told through the eyes of a teenage boy (that I've read in any case). 

I got to the end of this book, and although I didn't particularly like any of the characters, I wished for a happy ending. You might think that this is giving things away, but not really, you'll have to read it to understand. They were teenagers just trying to do what they thought were right. I think part of my problem with some of it was that it was very American in style and I'd like to think that Australian teenagers wouldn't be quite that useless. Luckily we don't have any serious snowstorms so none of the kids around here will be in that situation.

      Fallen Grace
        by Mary Hooper

It's London, 1861l. The year that Albert, Queen Victoria's Consort passes away and the year our heroine Grace Parkes, 15 year old orphan is stuck in the depths of poverty with her simple sister, pregnant and no one to turn to.

This new offering from English writer Mary Hooper follows in a similar vein to many of her previous historical fiction books. Grace as our protagonist is likeable and sympathy for her plight is easy to come by. She is a devoted sister to Lily, who is as they say, is 'simple' and will never grow up, but Grace also has enough character to slightly loose her temper at Lily occasionally which humanises what would otherwise be an unbelievable goody-two-shoes. The usual missing fortune, stolen identities and a clear delineation between good and evil characters is the general mode of the story and doesn't hold any surprises in that way.

What makes this one slightly different and for me are two aspects of the book itself. Firstly it is presented with large text and easy prose that would appeal to older middle-fiction readers (i.e. 12-14 year olds). However there is some seriously adult themes running throughout the entire story that I wouldn't deem appropriate for this age group (teenage pregnancy due to unwanted solicitations being the main one). Although never dealt with in a graphic manner, the way in which the stillborn child is treated at the beginning of the book took me by surprise and somewhat alarmed me. I would recommend this book to an older (16-18) girl who might not be keen on reading. The flowing easy prose, with a sympathetic character and lots of cliches to keep a girl going through a rainy afternoon.

By Kate Rockstrom