Hidden by Miriam Halahmy
Nov. 24th, 2011 07:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quippeThe Blurb On The Back:
There’s so much hidden in this little hut, and whatever I’ve dived into here is only going to get more complicated.
Alix is just an ordinary fourteen year old, living at the bottom of quiet Hayling Island. But one cold, misty Saturday on the beach she and Samir suddenly find themselves saving a drowning immigrant. Faced with the most difficult decision of their lives, what should Alix and Samir do?
A literary coming-of-age novel, dealing with courage, prejudice, judgement, and the difficulty of sorting right from wrong in our complex world.
Alix and her mum live in a small cottage on Hayling Island. Things have been tough since Alix’s dad left to be with another woman and they get harder still when her mum breaks her leg, leaving Alix to do everything around the house. Life isn’t much better at school, where she’s disturbed by the racism that comes out in school during a class on immigration – particularly the abuse directed at her classmate Samir, which prompts her to try and find out more about him and his family.
One morning, she and Samir see a man thrown out of a boat into the freezing water. Together they save the man’s life but it’s obvious that he’s an illegal immigrant and worse, he’s been tortured. As Alix and Samir try to work out what to do with the man, anti-immigration feeling in Hayling grows and soon they find it difficult to know who to trust, let alone what action they should take.
Miriam Halahmy’s debut YA novel (the first in a trilogy) is a beautifully written, literary look at immigration from a teenager’s point of view.
Alix is essentially someone who wants to do the right thing but finds it difficult to know what that is given the complex issues surrounding immigration and asylum seekers. Her developing friendship with Samir forces her to think more deeply about what those issues really mean and I enjoyed the way the pair slowly come to trust each other. Alix’s first person voice is also strongly realised.
However for me the most interesting character is actually the morally ambivalent Lindy who’s not above bullying other girls, whose brother is racist and yet who seems to have her own code because she’s the only character who isn’t predictable in the story. This isn’t to take away from the writing (which is excellent) but because this is an issue-based novel, the characters are painted in broad shades, which means there isn’t much of a surprise in how they act. For me it’s both a strength and a weakness of the book.
The small community of Hayling Island is well portrayed and Halahmy has a good eye and ear for the school scenes, which feel very believable.
All in all this is a well written, thought-provoking book with a strong contemporary feel that I’d recommend to any YA reader interested in a good story.
The Verdict:
Miriam Halahmy’s debut YA novel is a beautifully written, literary look at immigration from a teenager’s point of view. As an issue-based book, there were times when the storytelling and characterisation was perhaps a little too broad, but this is both a strength and a weakness and it doesn’t detract from the fact that this is a well-written, thought-provoking book with a strong contemporary feel.
Alix is just an ordinary fourteen year old, living at the bottom of quiet Hayling Island. But one cold, misty Saturday on the beach she and Samir suddenly find themselves saving a drowning immigrant. Faced with the most difficult decision of their lives, what should Alix and Samir do?
A literary coming-of-age novel, dealing with courage, prejudice, judgement, and the difficulty of sorting right from wrong in our complex world.
Alix and her mum live in a small cottage on Hayling Island. Things have been tough since Alix’s dad left to be with another woman and they get harder still when her mum breaks her leg, leaving Alix to do everything around the house. Life isn’t much better at school, where she’s disturbed by the racism that comes out in school during a class on immigration – particularly the abuse directed at her classmate Samir, which prompts her to try and find out more about him and his family.
One morning, she and Samir see a man thrown out of a boat into the freezing water. Together they save the man’s life but it’s obvious that he’s an illegal immigrant and worse, he’s been tortured. As Alix and Samir try to work out what to do with the man, anti-immigration feeling in Hayling grows and soon they find it difficult to know who to trust, let alone what action they should take.
Miriam Halahmy’s debut YA novel (the first in a trilogy) is a beautifully written, literary look at immigration from a teenager’s point of view.
Alix is essentially someone who wants to do the right thing but finds it difficult to know what that is given the complex issues surrounding immigration and asylum seekers. Her developing friendship with Samir forces her to think more deeply about what those issues really mean and I enjoyed the way the pair slowly come to trust each other. Alix’s first person voice is also strongly realised.
However for me the most interesting character is actually the morally ambivalent Lindy who’s not above bullying other girls, whose brother is racist and yet who seems to have her own code because she’s the only character who isn’t predictable in the story. This isn’t to take away from the writing (which is excellent) but because this is an issue-based novel, the characters are painted in broad shades, which means there isn’t much of a surprise in how they act. For me it’s both a strength and a weakness of the book.
The small community of Hayling Island is well portrayed and Halahmy has a good eye and ear for the school scenes, which feel very believable.
All in all this is a well written, thought-provoking book with a strong contemporary feel that I’d recommend to any YA reader interested in a good story.
The Verdict:
Miriam Halahmy’s debut YA novel is a beautifully written, literary look at immigration from a teenager’s point of view. As an issue-based book, there were times when the storytelling and characterisation was perhaps a little too broad, but this is both a strength and a weakness and it doesn’t detract from the fact that this is a well-written, thought-provoking book with a strong contemporary feel.
