CHILDREN’S

book of the week

STORM

by Nicola Skinner, published by Harper Collins Children’s Books, priced £12.99 (ebook £6.49). Available now STORM is a highly original and humorous novel by the author of the acclaimed Bloom.

Frances Frida Ripley (or Frankie for short) experiences a short life, an untimely death, and something very extraordinary in between.

After being born in a storm to woefully unprepared parents, she grows into a fiery child with a permanent temper - who then loses her life in a freak natural disaster that wipes out her whole town.

Waking up over 100 years later as a poltergeist, she finds plenty more things to be angry about, including tourists invading her personal space. She is befriended by a boy called Scanlon, who has the ability to see ghosts, but there are those who want to trap ghosts and exploit them. Scanlon must pick a side, and Frankie must find a way to harness the storm inside her...

This is a funny, surprising and gripping read that mums and dads will enjoy as much as kids.