Storm

By Author / Illustrator

Nicola Skinner, Flavia Sorrentino

Genre

Personal Growth

Age range(s)

Publisher

HarperCollins Publishers

ISBN

9780008295325

Format

Hardback

Published

02-04-2020

Synopsis

The extraordinarily moving, funny and original new novel from the author of the rapturously acclaimed BLOOM.

"You were born raging, Frances Frida Ripley. That's what happens when you're born in a storm." Frances's parents were not prepared for her birth: they had a blanket and an easel and some paint, but not anything useful, like a car or a phone. So it's no wonder Frankie has always had a temper. She was born on a BEACH, in a STORM.

What Frances was not prepared for was dying in a freak natural disaster that wiped out her whole town. Waking up 100 years later, Frances finds a whole load of new things to be angry about. And that's before the visitors start turning up, treating her home like it's a tourist attraction. Which it is. Only there are worse people out there than tourists... and they're coming for Frankie.

Frankie is about to discover that there are things more important than herself - and that anger has its uses. Because when you have a storm inside you - sometimes the only thing to do is let it out...

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Reviews

Frances Frida Ripley: born in a storm (or so her parents so often reminisce), filled with anger and unrest. She spends her life being told to quieten down, to control her anger, to just be something that she's not. But she can't! She can't be like her sweet sister Bridie, she can't be like her father and lose herself in the 'beauty' of the raging sea, she can't be like her mother. She can only be herself and that doesn't seem good enough.

When the worst thing that could ever happen does happen (and it's all her fault - or so she thinks), she still continues to rage: at the unfairness of it all, that nobody can 'hear' her, that she just can't 'do' all the things that she wants to do. But sometimes we need to go on a journey - a journey to find the good within us. Frances Ripley has to discover the beauty within her and to value her worth. She does have a voice, she can use her rage and anger in a focused and positive way - she just has to dig deep to find it. But how can she do that when everything she knows and loves is gone?

Storm took me on a complete journey. Frances' story is told in three parts: life, afterlife and time to make a change. It is a unique and captivating story that links different worlds together with much imagination and integrity. The feelings and emotions felt by the main character are so raw that we cannot help but be moved by her plight and feel her pain at each stage of her quest for acceptance.

For readers age 9+; themes of life and death, friendships, family, loneliness, anger, acceptance and perseverance are all covered in this wonderful story.

400 pages / Ages 9-12 years / Reviewed by Donna Burkert, teacher