Buying a one-way ticket and taking off with only your sketchpad and backpack is a dizzying possibility after months under lockdown and foreign travel restrictions. In Sara Barnard’s Destination Anywhere (Macmillan), 17-year-old Peyton does exactly that, leaving behind years of isolation and bullying. Gorgeous vistas of Canada and newfound travel friends are interspersed with her tumultuous final year in sixth form in a highly relatable journey of self-discovery.
More vicarious travels are to be found in Things to Do Before the End of the World by Emily Barr (Penguin). In a near-future, Earth’s breathable air is fast running out: how would you spend your final months? As the apocalypse looms, Olivia spends a blisteringly hot summer travelling through England, France and Spain with long-lost cousin Natasha, family secrets unravelling as seizing the moment takes on new resonance. Though written before Covid, the idea of normal life being utterly upended feels eerily prescient.
Back to Spain for The Fountains of Silence by Carnegie medal winner Ruta Sepetys (Penguin). It is 1957 and Franco’s Madrid has a distinctly dystopian air. Following the imprisonment of her mother and execution of her father, Ana lives silenced by the regime in a rundown shack, a stark contrast to the money and decadence of the hotel where she works as a maid. Her growing relationship with budding American photojournalist Daniel begins to unlock the menacing truths of life in Spain in an immersive and compassionate novel.
There’s dystopia of a different kind in Jonathan Stroud’s The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne (Walker). A future England lies in ruins, a land of hilltop fortifications and wild forests. Teenage outlaw Scarlett McCain lives off daring bank heists, a lone agent until she meets Albert Browne, the only survivor of a deadly crash and not who he first appears to be. Stroud’s writing is a treat; brilliantly crafted world building, taut action scenes, fabulous villains and witty dialogue. A wild ride indeed, and the first in a series.
Back to the present in Kacen Callender’s Felix Ever After (Faber), a National Book award winner in the US. In New York City, Felix is grappling with identity, growing up and falling in love for the first time, fearful that as a black, queer, transgender teenager he is one marginalisation too many. This outstanding coming-of-age novel feels raw and real, full of nuance and empathy, touching on complicated family relationships and cyberbullying.
More high-school drama in Holly Bourne’s The Yearbook (Usborne), in which a tribe of toxic mean girls rule a UK secondary school. When they infiltrate the year 11 yearbook committee pedalling their own version of the truth, can aspiring reporter Paige find the strength and means to expose them? Searingly honest and laced with humour, The Yearbook takes a shrewd look at cliques, bullying and the darker side of school life.
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