This Mortal Coil by Emily Suvada

 

 

View on Amazon

 

2017 

This is a fast-paced novel where the stakes and the tension remain high. The young people, and in particular protagonist Catarina Agatta, take huge risks. They face pain and violence. Certainly here we come across Christopher Vogler’s ‘trials, allies and enemies’ or Joseph Campbell’s ‘road of ‘trials’ in their respective story theories.   

Emily Suvada presents us with a thoughtfully conceived world.  The story takes place as the planet is swept by a dangerous virus. Some people are secured in bunkers but this comes at a cost. 

People are coded and programmed like computers. Even DNA can be altered by the cleverest of the programmers such as Catarina’s father Lachlan Agatta. It’s difficult to understand this technology but Suvada herself has checked out her facts and indeed I’ve also run them past a scientist. A world like this can exist and probably will in the future. We’re heading that way already. That alone makes this book very readable. 

There is some sexual tension as well as Cat operates with three young men. This is not the main thrust of the story, however.

We can read this book on two levels. It can be taken at face value as a dystopian thriller or we can see the plague itself, its side effects and the way it is tackled as symbolic of society, even of our current society.  

A riddle is solved by the end of the book but we are straight away presented with another. Suvada leaves the way nicely open for the sequel.      
               

Being by Kevin Brooks

 

2007 

Fostered sixteen-year old Robert Smith goes for a routine endoscopy and things go badly wrong.

The novel is a car chase from the very beginning. Short sentences and frequent line-breaks maintain a fast pace. Kevin Brooks keeps us guessing all of the time. The pace slows later as the story turns to romance and sex. 

Robert tells his own story in a first person immediate narrative that as so often in books written for young adults makes the reader feel as though the narrator is their best friend and is telling their story in order to work what has happened. 

Is it a thriller? Is it a science fiction?  There is violence and Robert takes risks. There are also elements of the thriller in this novel.  

There is something odd about Robert and the reader is left to find her own explanation. 

The fast pace and the thriller elements in the first part of the story make it seem suitable for teens. 

The content in the latter half of the book brings it more firmly into the YA area.                  

The Devil's Angel by Kevin Brooks

2007

Dean certainly seems like a devil yet his friendship with protagonist Jack is sincere and firm. They have a grand adventure together but it does not end well.  However, their friendship continues until Jack has enough of the hard times they share together. Timing is not good; they are about to get a record deal with for their band. Jack later feels responsible for Dean’s death which he can also trace back to the time when he was stabbed as thy set off on their grand adventure.  Jack has mixed emotions about this friendship.     

This book is a high-low produced by Barrington Stoke who specialise in such books.  They are tested for children and young people by children and young people.  

The chapters are short.  The print is clear in a non-serif font and is formatted ragged right.  It is printed on pale yellow paper. Thus there are several aids for  the dyslexic reader.