Book Review: Bog Child by Siobhan Dowd

The double story line and rather challenging language make this a book I'd recommend for teenagers and adults rather than children. It's very much a coming of age novel, but there's much more to it than that.

Seventeen-year old Fergus discovers the body of a girl in a peat bog on the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. The author uncovers the historical account of the girl's tragic life alongside the present drama of Fergus' own life. Fergus' brother is on hunger strike in the Maze prison and the family's loyalties are divided. When asked by a friend to ferry parcels with an unknown content across the border, Fergus agrees in the hope it will help save his brother's life. But every day his brother is getting close to death.

The plot of the book is compelling and has all the ingredients of a page-turner: suspense, humour, red-herrings and unexpected revelations. Add to this the dual historical backgrounds and well developed characters and you have a book well worth reading. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
You can read excellent reviews of this book on amazon UK http://www.amazon.co.uk/ and USA http://www.amazon.com/ .

Patrick Ness wins Booktrust Teenage Prize

Patrick Ness rounded off a successful 2008 by winning the Booktrust Teenage Prize for his novel, The Knife of Never Letting Go.

The announcement was made at a prizegiving ceremony in London, where Patrick was presented with a trophy and a cheque for £2,500.

The Knife of Never Letting Go is Patrick's first novel for teenagers and has been widely acclaimed, winning him the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, a longlisting for the Carnegie Medal and a placing as one of Amazon's top 100 books for 2008.

Speaking at the ceremony, Chair of Judges, Amanda Craig said, "In a strong year for Young Adult fiction, the judges of the Booktrust Teenage Prize selected six novels that we all felt were outstanding for the scope of their imagination, their originality, their writing and their appeal.

The Knife of Never Letting Go made the judges laugh, cry and debate its contents with passion; a striking mixture of thriller, science fiction and literary tour de force, it's influenced by writers as diverse as Laurence Sterne and Ursula le Guin and should appeal to a large readership."


The Booktrsust Teenage Prize judges included five children who won their places on the judging panel by submitting the best entries to a Booktrust competition. (Writers' News Feb 2009)