At 182 pages this is a respectable length for a teen / late
middle grade book. Yet I read it extremely quickly. I started yesterday morning
and I it finished this morning. It just carried me along.
Jake is a pleasant enough young man but falters a little when
his baby sister arrives. She is the daughter of his biological mother and the
man he calls dad. Sally from round the corner and her elderly next-door
neighbour befriend him and give him food for thought. Then some other things happen
but I won’t tell you what because I don’t want to spoil it for you.
Why did it hold me so much?
The chapters are just the right length. Some of them are
very short. Some of them are longer but none are too long. All, actually, are just
exactly as long as they need to be. Jake’s voice is just right. He’s a great
character, anyway, as is Sally, and Mrs Kennedy – the old lady-with-arthritis
from next-door. Other adults and children hover in the background but they are
no less real or rounded. The adults are clumsy, as is often the case in books written
for this age group, yet we can’t help but forgive them. Siobhán Parkinson treats them kindly.
A lovely read indeed.
