I am putting it out there straight away: I am no fan of science-fiction. Spaceships, other planets, aliens etc … apart from in a dystopian setting (in small doses) , they don’t do much for me. But Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time has been calling me for a while. Firstly because it is a crucial to …
science-fiction
The Girl Who Leapt Through Time
Yasutaka Tsutsuitranslated from Japanese by David Karashima(Alma Books) Fifteen-year-old Kazuko is busy cleaning up the school science lab when something odd happens: she appears to have disturbed an intruder fiddling with chemicals, suddenly smells a strong scent of lavender and then faints. After this freak accident, she finds herself with a strange gift: what she first mistakes …
TimeRiders
Alex Scarrow(Puffin) Liam O’Connor (1912), Maddy Carter (2010), Sal Vikram (2026). Three teenagers, living decades away from each other are suddenly thrown together in a small room near Brooklyn Bridge, in September 2001. They have one things in common: all three should have died, all three were given the choice to turn away from their …
Across the Universe
Beth Revis (Puffin/Razorbill) Seventeen year-old Amy’s parents have decided to be cryogenically frozen, trapped in time, in order to be taken on a 350 year- long space journey on a mission to investigate and colonise a new planet. As a high-ranked US Army office and a genetics specialist, they are essential to the mission. Amy, …
Matched
Ally Condie(Puffin) Cassia is seventeen years-old today and it is also the day of her Matching Banquet; tonight she will meet the boy that she will eventually marry. She does not get to decide who she will love, the society and its officials do. As she travels to the Banquet with her family, she knows …
I Am Number Four
Pittacus Lore(Puffin) In the beginning there were nine of us.Three are gone, dead.There are six of us left.They are hunting us, and they won’t stop until they’ve killed us all. I am Number Four.I know that I am next.John Smith has been on the run all his life, alongside his guardian Henri. Every time “they” …
Genesis
Bernard Beckett(Quercus) Anax aspires to join The Academy, the elite institution which runs the utopian society she has brought up in and with the help of tutor Pericles, she has been working hard to prepare for the gruelling admittance interview which lasts for five hours and focuses on one subject only. Anax has chosen to …
Boom!
Mark Haddon(David Fickling Books) First, what a fantastic cover! Bright orange, very touchy-feely, and no blurb to give anything away. This book definitely shouts out “Read Me” to potential readers. Like most people I had read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time and loved it. I was aware that Mark Haddon …