Photograph: PR
Edge-of-your-seat-type books are trickling further down the age range – not quite horror, but certainly creepy and thrill-laden. Two gripping summer reads stand out, probably best serving the key stage 2s on up.
The Last Life of Lori Mills (HarperCollins) by debut author and inveterate gamer Max Boucherat recalls a number of books and films that have blurred reality and virtuality, but Boucherat’s breathless voice and granular world creation zings off the page. Eleven-year-old Lori is unexpectedly home alone and determined to play Voxminer – her obsession – after her bedtime. Soon, she spots her own bedroom door inside the game. What follows, in reverse-order chapters, is a hair-raising romp through a swampy netherworld where her alter ego RoaryCat11 must use in-game ingenuity and IRL guts to outfox the scary Shade Girl and get back to her own room alive.
