Happiness Seeker by Jennifer Burkinshaw,

 

So, this month I’m recommending: Happiness Seeker by Jennifer Burkinshaw

Yes, again I’ve chosen a text for younger readers again.  I could hardly put this one down.  

Allie is at Grange-Over-Sands on a school trip. The very place is beautiful and dangerous at the same time.   

There are other delights and dangers too. Allie is irritated by the relationship developing between her best friend and her nemesis. Then she becomes romantically involved with the mysterious Mareno. He is threatened not just from the shifting sands and strong currents. Allie’s attempt to put this right is doomed to failure.  When her greatest enemy attempts to right a wrong, four lives are put in danger. There are deaths and near misses. This text tackles some modern but also age old problem: migration and modern slavery.            

Happiness Seeker is beautifully narrated by the very talented Jennifer Burkinshaw.    

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay may go to Bridge House publishing.  

 

 

 

Leila and the Blue Fox by Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston

 

The stories of refugee Leila and blue fox Miso intertwine.   

Both travel a long way.  Leila flees from Syria to live in London and then travels on to the Arctic to join her mother who is documenting the fox’s journey. Miso’s story is based on a true one: Anna the fox walked over 2000 miles in seventy-six days. Both Leila and Miso are seeking something. Will they find it?      

Kiran Millwood Hargraves’s text is touching and Tom de Freston’s illustrations are delightful. I read the hardback version of Leila and the Blue Fox. This would make a delightful Christmas present for a child.  

Find on Amazon.  

Note, this is an affiliate link and a small portion of what you pay may go to Bridge House publishing.   

The House of Serendipity, Sequins and Secrets by Lucy Ivison, illustrated by Catharine Collingridge

 

Class barriers are dropped as two young girls plot to help an older sibling and her friend wow the rest of the world. 

Myrtle and Sylvie become a team. First of all they design and make a superb dress for Sylvie’s sister Delphine.  Then they become involved with Agapantha Portland-Prince who wants to wear trousers for her coming-out ball and also wants to disguise herself as a man so that she can go on an exotic adventure.

It almost all works but a misunderstanding almost spells disaster.

Lucy Ivison tells a good story and Catharine Collingridge charms us with her exqusitie fashion drawings in The House of Serendipity, Sequins and Secrets

Dawn Knox’s A Folly in Plotlands

 

A heart-warming story of romance and survival.

Dismissed from a school where she was neve really that happy but that had been home for her for a long time, Samira Stewart cultivates an unlikely relationship with her estranged grandmother. She has to grow up quickly. She takes care of the ailing old lady who doesn’t deserve the attention that is now lavished on her. Then her brother and uncle really start to make life difficult. She falls in love and a childhood illness almost stops her beloved from staying with her.

Expert story-teller Dawn Knox’s A Folly in Plotland is an uplifting read.  Enjoy!                   

East of Eden by John Steinbeck

 

This month I’m recommending another John Steinbeck: East of Eden

This time we are dealing with a man who has plenty of money.

Yet there are still struggles. He has a strained relationship with his half-brother, partly caused by his father’s expectations. His wife flees the family home. She seems to have some sort of personality disorder. He and his manservant bring up the twin sons who have something of Cain and Abel about them; indeed their behaviour rather reflects that.

In the end this is about a dysfunctional family but we can forgive them. Another long text, but John Steinbeck keeps the reader engaged through his well-drawn characters in this classic novel, East of Eden.