Review: In Another Life - Laura Jarratt

In Another Life by Laura Jarratt, published by Electric Monkey on 4th June 2015

Goodreads synopsis:
American sisters Hannah and Jenny Tooley have spent their lives dreaming of flying to the UK and visiting all the places their English mother has told them about. But Jenny’s dream turns to a nightmare when she vanishes without a trace.

Hannah and her father arrive in England to a big police investigation. As Hannah gets to know some of Jenny’s friends and acquaintances, she realises that her sister is up to her neck in something – and the mysterious text messages she’s receiving bear this out. She is particularly drawn to Harry and, against her better judgement, begins to fall in love.

Review:
I raced through this book in a couple of hours.  The story is so gripping that I felt myself pulled along by my intrigue behind the disappearance of Hannah's older sister Jenny.  I have read all of Laura Jarratt's previous books and I think this one might be my favourite so far. 

Hannah and her father arrive in England to help with the investigation into Jenny's disappearance.  Hannah is determined to find out what really happened to her beloved sister and begins to try to piece together Jenny's movements with the help of her employers and friends.  As she begins to get to know the people that saw her sister last, she finds herself falling for local boy Harry who she finds herself unwittingly drawn towards. 

This was a fantastic thriller.  I am usually really good at guessing all the twists and turns and I will often pick out the guilty party after the first few chapters, but I was totally wrong-footed this time.  I did have my suspicions and I thought I'd worked out what Laura Jarratt was up to with the plot but I was headed down a blind alley.  She brilliantly surprised me with a shocking and frankly quite chilling plot twist that turned everything on it's head. 

The story combined drama, deception and romance and will keep readers on their toes as they try to discover not only the truth about Jenny but also the threat that hangs over Hannah's head.  I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this book to fans of this genre.        

Review: By Any Other Name - Laura Jarratt

By Any Other Name by Laura Jarratt, published by Electric Monkey on 1st April 2013

Goodreads synopsis:
Nobody can know the truth - her life depends on it. I picked up the book and thumbed through the pages. Names in alphabetical order, names with meanings, names I knew, names I'd never heard of. How to pick? Nothing that would stand out, nothing that would link me to the past - those were the instructions. The past. As if everything that had gone before this moment was buried already. Holly is fifteen years old, but she's only been "Holly" for a matter of months. Because of something that happened, she and her family have had to enter witness protection and have all assumed new identities. All, that is, except her sister Katie, who is autistic. Starting at a new school mid-term is hard enough at the best of times, and Holly has no clue who she is any more. Lonely and angry, she reaches out to friends - new and old. But one wrong move will put all their lives in danger...

Review:
This is the second book by Laura Jarratt and like her first title 'Skin Deep', explores different territory to many other contemporary young-adult novels currently on the market.  The main theme is about making sense of who you are as a person and developing your own identity, rather than being labelled by everyone else around you.  The main character Holly struggles to do exactly this, when her family is entered into the witness protection programme and she has to leave everything familiar behind.  Starting over is difficult and it was interesting reading to see how Holly coped with establishing herself in a new town and having to make new friends.

The secret of why Holly's family are in witness protection is hinted at throughout the book but the big reveal doesn't come until near the end.  I didn't guess the real reason why and so found the truth when it was gradually unveiled, quite shocking.  It made me go back and think again about many things that had happened in the story and gave me even more admiration for Holly.

Laura Jarratt writes complex and layered characters.  There is often more to them than first meets the eye.  Holly's new friend Joe is an example of this - someone with a lot of layers whose outward appearance doesn't tell you everything you need to know about him.  Her younger sister Katie is another.  Katie is autistic and I think actually the first character with autism that I've seen in a young-adult book.  I liked the bond between the two sisters and the way that Holly is so protective towards her. 

Although I didn't enjoy 'By Any Other Name' quite as much as 'Skin Deep' which I was literally head over heels for, it was still a thought-provoking and excellent read, which was well-written and proves once again what a brilliant writer Laura Jarratt is. 

Blog Tour: By Any Other Name - Laura Jarratt

I'm taking part in the blog tour for Laura Jarratt's new book 'By Any Other Name' and I have a fantastic guest post to share with you from Laura herself.

Holly in By Any Other Name is hiding a huge secret from everyone in her new life. But she’s not the only character in the book with something to hide. Joe’s covering something up too, and that kind of gets to Holly. What is going on with him and why should she care anyway? She’ll have to wait a while to find out…

She’s not alone in finding a boy with a secret intriguing – who doesn’t like a little mystery? I can’t resist that lure so love to these fictional guys (in no particular order): 

1.      Alec Lightwood from Cassandra Clare’s City of Bones

Alec with his hopeless dress sense and stabbing jealousy of Clary is one of Cassie Clare’s most endearing characters. Forever trying to do the right thing and never quite managing it, life and sexuality confuse him. And Magnus Bane confuses him most of all…

2.      Four from Veronica Roth’s Divergent

Four probably wins my vote for most adorable male mc in YA fiction right now. And he’s an enigma from the start. Oh, we know before Tris does why he doesn’t want to watch her fight but for the rest he’s a gorgeous bundle of mystery you can’t wait to see unwrapped. Actually you’ll still love him just as much when you know his secrets in Insurgent, the next book in the series.

3.      Ronan Lynch from Maggie Stiefvater’s The Raven Boys

I never go for the bad boys – never! So I’m defending Ronan as a good boy with extreme issues. I just don’t know what they are yet as Maggie Stiefvater is stringing us all out on just what Ronan’s secret is. However you can’t not love a character described as ‘a soldier in a war where the enemy was everyone else.’ I have faith that Ronan will turn out to be a secret gem eventually.

4.      Nick Ryves from Sarah Rees Brennan’s The Demon’s Lexicon

Now Nick is a bad boy, but he is too funny to dismiss and his complete lack of understanding of the motives of everyone around him mean he’s one of the most original characters in urban fantasy. And his secret…I couldn’t possibly give anything away but my jaw hit the floor. I did not see that coming at all. Kudos to Sarah Rees Brennan for one of the best and most surprising revelations in YA fantasy.

5.      Lucas from Kevin Brooks’ Lucas

The beautiful and completely mystifying Lucas turns up on Caitlin’s island and by contrast shows just how ugly other people can be. All the grit of a usual Kevin Brooks novel paired with a fairytale-like quality that works – probably no one but Kevin Brooks could get that particular combination right. You never will entirely understand Lucas but not everything is life can be understood.

6.      Sirius from Diana Wynne Jones’ Dogsbody

A departure from YA to venture into children’s book territory. Sirius is a luminary punished for a crime he didn’t commit and forced to hide in the body of a dog until he can prove his innocence. An absolutely beautiful piece of characterisation inside one of the defining books of my childhood. To be able to create the personality of a star inside a dog and stay true to both requires staggering talent.

7.      Mr Rochester in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre

My favourite Bronte male. Well, he just made a real mess of things when he was younger, didn’t he? And pays the price and tries to make it as right as he can. Until he falls in love and gets himself in another pickle. Completely fallible and so very human because of that, Rochester is a decent guy who wants to be loved. Aww, come on, how can you not have a soft spot for him?

8.      Magnus Bane from Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments and Infernal Devices series

Ah, Magnus – just a walking ball of secrets. He unfurls them slowly, showering glitter as he goes, through all of Cassandra Clare’s books. The thing about Magnus is he’s so gloriously outrageous and also so wise – I guess immortality can do that to you though it doesn’t seem to have worked so well for some of the vampires – and at times so very, very sad you want to cry for him. I love at lot of Cassie Clare’s secondary characters (oddly not her main characters so much), especially the kick-ass Isabelle, but Magnus is her finest creation.

Hotly Anticipated Reads for 2013: Egmont's Electric Monkey

Egmont is the publisher of one of my absolute favourite books, 'Forgotten' by Cat Patrick. They have some stellar titles lined up for 2013 (January-June) under their imprint Electric Monkey (although I'm still gutted that they aren't publishing the last book in Cynthia Hand's trilogy), so here's a selection of the ones which I'm most eagerly anticipating for next year.

All links go to Goodreads where you can add all of these books to your wishlist!

* Finished cover art may not be available yet for all titles

From What I Remember by Stacy Kramer and Valerie Thomas, published 7th January

KYLIE: MEXICO WHAT? I should be putting the finishing touches on my valedictorian speech. Graduation is TODAY, and is this a wedding band on my finger.

MAX: It all started with Kylie's laptop and a truck full of stolen electronics. Okay, it was kind of hot, the way she broke us out like some chick in an action movie. But now we're stranded in Tijuana. With less than twenty-four hours before graduation. Awesome.

WILL: Saving Kylie Flores from herself is kind of a full-time occupation. Luckily, I, Will Bixby, was born for the job. And when I found out she was stuck in Mexico with dreamy Max Langston, sure, I agreed to bring their passports across the border -- but there's no reason to rush back home right away. This party is just getting started.

LILY: I just walked in on my boyfriend, Max Langston, canoodling with Kylie Flores, freak of the century. Still, I can't completely hold it against him. He NEEDS me. It's even clearer now. And I'm not giving him up without a fight.

Survive by Alex Morel, published in February

Jane is on a plane on her way home to Montclair, New Jersey, from a mental hospital. She is about to kill herself. Just before she can swallow a lethal dose of pills, the plane hits turbulence and everything goes black. Jane wakes up amidst piles of wreckage and charred bodies on a snowy mountaintop. There is only one other survivor: a boy named Paul, who inspires Jane to want to fight for her life for the first time.

Jane and Paul scale icy slopes and huddle together for warmth at night, forging an intense emotional bond. But the wilderness is a vast and lethal force, and only one of them will survive.

Skinny by Donna Cooner, published 4th February

Hopeless. Freak. Elephant. Pitiful. These are the words of Skinny, the vicious voice that lives inside fifteen-year-old Ever Davies’s head. Skinny tells Ever all the dark thoughts her classmates have about her. Ever knows she weighs over three hundred pounds, knows she’ll probably never be loved, and Skinny makes sure she never forgets it.

But there is another voice: Ever’s singing voice, which is beautiful but has been silenced by Skinny. Partly in the hopes of trying out for the school musical—and partly to try and save her own life—Ever decides to undergo a risky surgery that may help her lose weight and start over.

With the support of her best friend, Ever begins the uphill battle toward change. But demons, she finds, are not so easy to shake, not even as she sheds pounds. Because Skinny is still around. And Ever will have to confront that voice before she can truly find her own.

Finding Cherokee Brown by Siobhan Curham, published 7th March

His lips touched mine and for one split second the whole world stopped. Then every cell in my body fizzed into life...When I decided to write a book about my life I thought I'd have to make loads of stuff up. I mean, who wants to read about someone like me? But as soon as I started writing, the weirdest thing happened. I found out I wasn't who I thought I was. And I stopped being scared. Then everything went crazy! Best of all, I discovered that when you finally decide to be brave it's like waving a wand over your life - the most magical things can happen...

By Any Other Name by Laura Jarratt, published 1st April

Nobody can know the truth - her life depends on it. I picked up the book and thumbed through the pages. Names in alphabetical order, names with meanings, names I knew, names I'd never heard of. How to pick? Nothing that would stand out, nothing that would link me to the past - those were the instructions. The past. As if everything that had gone before this moment was buried already. Holly is fifteen years old, but she's only been "Holly" for a matter of months. Because of something that happened, she and her family have had to enter witness protection and have all assumed new identities. All, that is, except her sister Katie, who is autistic. Starting at a new school mid-term is hard enough at the best of times, and Holly has no clue who she is any more. Lonely and angry, she reaches out to friends - new and old. But one wrong move will put all their lives in danger...

Light by Michael Grant, published in April

It’s been more than a year since every person over the age of fourteen disappeared from the town of Perdido Beach, California. In that time, countless battles have been fought: Battles against hunger and lies and plagues and worse, battles of good against evil, and kid against kid. Allegiances have been won, lost, betrayed, and won again; ideologies have been shattered and created anew, and the kids of the FAYZ have begun to believe that their new society is the only life they’ll ever know. But now that the Darkness has found a way to be reborn, the tenuous existence they‘ve established is likely to be shattered for good. Will the kids of Perdido Beach even survive?

The Originals by Cat Patrick, published 6th May

I glance at the three baby portraits. I feel a familiar prickling on the back of my neck. Because I know there's another picture somewhere - and the baby in that photo looks identical to the babies on the wall. Somewhere, there's a photo of the Original. Ella and I look like sisters: triplets, you might think. But that's not what we are at all. We are clones in hiding. We split our lives and exist as one person in the outside world. And we've always been happy. But now I've fallen head-over-heels in love...and that changes everything. Because, to let love in, I need to be allowed to be Me.

Charm and Strange by Stephanie Kuehn, published 3rd June

 'Don't. Please don't say my name. You have no idea who I really am.' No one really knows who Andrew Winston Winters is. Least of all himself. He is part Win, a lonely teenager exiled to a remote boarding school in the wake of a family tragedy. The guy who shuts the whole world out, no matter the cost, because his darkest fear is of himself...of the wolfish predator within. But he's also part Drew, the angry boy with violent impulses that control him. The boy who, one fateful summer, was part of something so terrible it came close to destroying him.

Scissors, Sisters and Manic Panics by Ellie Phillips, published 3rd June

Sadie Nathanson's back - with more style and tangles than ever before. "Mrs Nellist came in for her cut and colour while Auntie and Tiffany were out the back having a coffee, leaving me to sweep up, and that's kind of where everything got really ugly. It was the hairstyle that Mrs Nellist never knew she wanted. That's all it was about. I don't know why everyone had to go so completely hysterical about it, but that's my family for you." Sadie Nathanson is back! After sorting out exactly who she is, she now feels ready to tackle who she is going to be! With hair as her focus, Sadie decides to enter a major hairdressing competition - though she has her work cut out for her when she gets fired from her Saturday job in Auntie Lilah's salon. And if that's not bad enough, it turns out there are yet still more surprises in store Dadwise...

 

Comment and let me know which titles you're most looking forward to in 2013!

Review: Skin Deep - Laura Jarratt

Skin Deep by Laura Jarratt, published by Electric Monkey on 5th March 2012

Goodreads synopsis:
Ugly people don't have feelings. They're not like everyone else. They don't notice if you stare at them and turn away. And if they did notice, it wouldn't hurt them. They're not like real people. Or that's what I used to think. Before I learned...

After the car crash that leaves her best friend dead, Jenna is permanently scarred. She struggles to rebuild her life, but every stare in the street, every time she looks in the mirror, makes her want to retreat further from the world. Until she meets Ryan. Ryan's a traveller. When he and his mother moor their narrow boat on the outskirts of a village, she tells him this time it will be different. He doesn't believe her; he can't imagine why this place shouldn't be as unwelcoming as the rest. Until he meets Jenna. But as Jenna and Ryan grow closer, repercussions from the crash continue to reverberate through the community. And then a body is found...

Review:
'Skin Deep' is a beautifully moving contemporary romance about a young girl scarred for life after a car accident which killed her best friend and a charismatic traveller called Ryan.  I'd been looking forward to reading this book ever since I first heard about it.  The initial extract I read got me really excited and when I finally got my hands on a finished copy I picked it up immediately.  I'm happy to report that it was just as good as I was expecting.

The two main characters, Jenna and Ryan, have really interesting stories and I liked seeing how their two lives gradually intersected.  Although it initially appears that Ryan is predominantly the one helping Jenna, as their relationship develops you can see that they're actually providing mutual support for each other.  Jenna is still struggling with the repercussions of the accident which changed her forever and Ryan also has problems of his own.  His mother is bipolar and he's had to learn to cope with her mood swings as well as the taunts from his peers about being a gypsy.  Just as he teaches Jenna not to be so self-conscious about her face, she teaches him acceptance too.  I felt a lot of empathy for both characters and what they have to deal with.  They're both so well written that I could really place myself in their shoes at points in the story.

I also liked the dual narrative which alternated between the two of them as this provided a better understanding of their personalities, thoughts and feelings. 

The romance between them is a sweet, tingly tale of first love and although Ryan is older and more experienced than Jenna, it was lovely to see how he treated her properly and with care and respect.  He's never afraid to stand up for her and to stand by her side, even when others are quick to whisper behind her back.  I loved the ending which I thought was very realistic and honest but I wanted to read more about them and found the end came far too quickly!  

This was a fantastic book and I certainly wouldn't hesitate to recommend 'Skin Deep' to anyone looking for a romantic read with real heart.  Much of the story is about the impact that one tragic event can have on peoples' lives and this was sensitively handled with real insight, compassion and empathy.  I look forward to reading more by Laura Jarratt in the future.