The Apprentice Witnesser
by Bren MacDibble (Allen & Unwin, $19.99)
Western Australia-resident Kiwi Bren MacDibble has impressive credentials – she has won our junior fiction award twice (for How to Bee and The Dog Runner) and, as Cally Black, taken the YA award for In the Dark Spaces. Now she continues her climate-crisis adventure novels with a tale featuring endearing, resilient characters in a post-pandemic, post-industrial setting that addresses perhaps our most pressing issue du jour: what is truth? Basti, an apprentice Witnesser of Miracles, takes snapshots of “little moments” on an old-school camera to authenticate incidents for her guardian, the storyteller Lodyma. Hope-full.
Nine Girls
by Stacy Gregg (Penguin, $22)
From a writer much loved for her horse stories – her standalone titles have made the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults finals eight times and scooped the coveted Children’s Choice three times in a row – comes a very different tale. No horses, for starters. Instead, at a turbulent time in our recent history, a peeved teen displaced from a posh Auckland suburb returns to her mother’s home town of Ngāruawāhia, divided by race and a river. There’s a mystery concerning buried treasure dating back to the land wars, tapu and – yes – a talking tuna (eel). The taniwha, with an impeccable tribal pedigree, is a device for imparting historical information, some of which I suspect young readers might skip. And don’t go looking for nine characters – the title is finally explained in an author’s note.
Deep is the Fen
by Lili Wilkinson (A&U, $27.99)
Australian writer Lili Wilkinson is nothing if not versatile. Her doomsday prepper novel, After the Lights Go Out, headed our 2018 50 Best list. With a huge online following, she offers a second dark fantasy – many, like my 15-year-old granddaughter Olive, enjoyed the previous Hunger of Thorns, not just for its stunning cover. Wilkinson, daughter of Australian historical fiction writer Carole Wilkinson, is great on plot, and I can take the mix of magic, secret societies (toads, anyone?) and witches, especially when it’s grounded in a convincing small town friendship circle of senior teens, flawed and all. But I’d have to put this right at the top of YA for its disturbing re-education camp passages. Like central character Merry, I felt lucky to get out of it alive.
Outlaw Girls
by Emily Gale & Nova Weetman (Text, $21)
A very Aussie story this, from a duo whose previous time-slip collab, Elsewhere Girls, was shortlisted for awards across the Tasman. This one features Ned Kelly’s last days from the point of view of his sister, Kate (a real person), and – a century on, looking back with full knowledge – city girl Ruby. Both are competent horsewomen, which allows them to meet in the bush clearing that becomes their portal. The other link in this “fictitious story including real events” is theft: Ruby is one of four kids who went to primary school together who are into shoplifting from the local supermarket but take on a tractor theft for a dare. The Kellys, of course, are stealing to stay alive, even before they hold up a bank.
Smoke & Mirrors
by Barry Jonsberg (A&U, $22.99)
Nothing is what it seems in this story of sassy teen Grace (aka Amazing Grace, amateur magician) and her cranky Gran, for whom she becomes caregiver. In many ways, the two are like mirror images – both rejecting help, refusing to face reality and making some very wrong judgments along the way. Sleight of hand, sarcasm, a brother who comes and goes … it’s a highly enjoyable and satisfying read.
