PARTNERS IN CRIME

 

 

PARTNERS IN CRIME is now 10 years old so it is particularly pleasing and surprising that it has just been shortlisted for a prize. It is in the Quick Reads category of the Coventry Inspiration Book Award. The award is for books which will get readers hooked on reading. The Coventry awards are unique in the country in that they have something for all ages, including adults and involve the whole family and the whole community.  

I guess that I always write in the hope that the book will hook young readers and make them readers for life, but this is especially true for the books I write for Barrington Stoke who specialise in producing books for young people who aren’t naturally drawn to reading.  

The Coventry award is decided in a novel way, as in January 2014 they hold weekly eliminations of the shortlist "Big Brother" style until only the winners are left standing. Fingers crossed that PARTNERS IN CRIME will be one of those.

Although PARTNERS IN CRIME does work with ‘reluctant’ readers, I recently saw how its appeal goes right across the spectrum. The book is being used by Folkestone Academy as part of their English course for all their Year 8 students. They invited me down to talk to the whole year group and I did four sessions in which I talked about writing in general and then PARTNERS IN CRIME in particular. I was very gratified to see and hear the students’ enthusiasm for the book – their questions and comments showed how much they had enjoyed and been engaged by the story as part of their course and teachers reported that many of them had borrowed the books to re-read at home. 

The students asked many interesting and wide-ranging questions in each of the sessions but one question that came up in all four sessions was who was who on the cover. It’s a credit to the cover designer that when I turned the question back on them and asked them to say which character was which they unfailingly identified Marco, Perry and Toddie.

If you've read and enjoyed the book, you can vote and comment on the Coventry Inspiration site :  http://www.coventry.gov.uk/info/2000735/fancy_a_quickie/2008/partners_in_crime