Julia Archer

Review of “The Road to Winter”

A near-future Australia has been devastated by a virus, the survivors clinging to life however they can. Finn is a survivor. Two years since his parents died and the rest of the locals fled, he and his dog Rowdy are the lone occupants of what was once a thriving holiday town, we assume on Victoria’sContinue reading “Review of “The Road to Winter””

Untidy Towns

Kate O’Donnell On the spur of the moment, Adelaide Longley walks out of her expensive Melbourne boarding school and boards the train home to her country town. We might expect Addie’s family to be upset, even angry, but the relationships in this family are warm, supportive and depicted in rich detail. They want AddieContinue reading “Untidy Towns”

Review of ‘Girl on a Plane’

It is one thing to be a fifteen-year-old English girl caught up in a mid-air plane hijacking. It is quite another to be able to recreate that experience decades later in a novel which puts the reader right there as one of the exhausted, terrified passengers. Miriam Moss achieves just that. As the fictional Anna,Continue reading “Review of ‘Girl on a Plane’”

Race Against Time

I was riding up my street, coming home from school. I always needed to stay pretty wide awake on the bike. There were no sidewalks in my neighborhood, my street was narrow, and drivers in Gulistan were often looking at their phones. This day an old guy was wandering up the middle of the street.Continue reading “Race Against Time”

Phone Power

It was the gentle growl of a light plane flying low over the city that snapped me around, eyes searching the sky. We don’t see a lot of them in Central Asia. And, more weird, the sound didn’t come from the usual flight path in and out of the Khan Sharif airport. We can seeContinue reading “Phone Power”

Crunch

I didn’t know how the dog was going to kill me, exactly. Drag me in front of a bus? Knock me over backwards and smash my skull? Rip me apart with his huge teeth? Poison my bloodstream with rabies-infected drool? We were headed for the park, because my biological father – which is all heContinue reading “Crunch”

Meg’s Guest Review of “Maybe”

It’s 1946. Poland is in ruins after the Second World War. Happiness is scarce. A fourteen-year-old juvenile named Felix is stranded in his own mind. A prevailing addition to Morris Gleitzman’s Once series, Maybe follows directly after the novel Soon. Gabriek is the middle-aged guardian of both Felix and Anya who is a recalcitrant pregnantContinue reading “Meg’s Guest Review of “Maybe””

Review of ‘Because of You’ by Pip Harry

Tiny and Nola should never have met. Tiny scrounges for food on the streets of Sydney, Australia, and is driven to steal sanitary supplies from a pharmacy. Nola and her friends are picking out $1000+ dresses for their Year 12 formal in a trendy Harbourside boutique. But Tiny hears the writing group at homeless shelterContinue reading “Review of ‘Because of You’ by Pip Harry”

How Grandpa Discovered Central Asia

Dreamstime photo I worried about Grandpa. After Nana died, he was all by himself in England, and we, his family, were over here in Central Asia. My Mum and Dad both have jobs here, and we couldn’t go home to keep Grandpa from being lonely. He’d never been out of England in his whole seventy-twoContinue reading “How Grandpa Discovered Central Asia”

Washaway

The bike ride with my brother was months ago, but the bad dreams still come. I still wake up in a sweat in the dark. We’d just wanted to get out of the house, to breathe some fresh air. We weren’t looking for trouble. Yeah, we do live in Central Asia. Sounds a bit dangerousContinue reading “Washaway”