LoveReading4Kids Says
LoveReading4Kids Says
October 2020 Book of the Month
| Shortlisted for the Yoto Carnegie Medal 2022 | Shortlisted for the UKLA Book Awards 2022 ages 7-10
Raw, lingering and stirringly lyrical, October, October had me hooked from opening to end.
Conjured in language that crackles and smoulders like an autumn bonfire, this is a book of bones and bark, of frost and flame, captivating in the manner of Skellig or Stig of the Dump as it undulates towards a wondrous homecoming of the heart.
“We live in the woods and we are wild… Just us. A pocket of people in a pocket of the world that’s small as a marble. We are tiny and we are everything and we are wild.” October has everything she wants living in the woods in the house her father built. Her mother left when October was four and she’s adamant that, “I don’t want her. She’s not wild like we are.”
This year October’s euphoria at the onset of autumn is sullied when she discovers a dead owl and a motherless baby owl: “my heart won’t stop bruising my ribs.” So, she rescues the baby, names it Stig and declares it her first ever friend. Calamity strikes when the woman “who calls herself my mother” arrives as a birthday surprise - her beloved dad breaks his spine after falling from a tree and October must stay with this woman – her mother – in London while he recuperates. In the chaotic city, October is a bird with clipped wings. Torn from her wild world, she implodes, becomes a “firework of fury”, until she strikes up a bond with a boy named Yusef and discovers mudlarking, which makes her once more “a wild animal skulking and prowling for food”, “a pirate hunting for treasure.”
An unforgettable story, an unforgettable heroine – it’s no exaggeration to hail this a future classic.
Joanne Owen
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About
October, October Synopsis
A classic in the making for anyone who ever longed to be WILD.
October and her dad live in the woods. They know the trees and the rocks and the lake and stars like best friends. They live in the woods and they are wild. And that's the way it is. Until the year October turns eleven. That's the year October rescues a baby owl. It's the year Dad falls out of the biggest tree in their woods. The year the woman who calls herself October's mother comes back. The year everything changes.
Written in Katya Balen's heart-stoppingly beautiful style, this book is a feast for the senses, filled with the woodsmoke smell of crisp autumn mornings and the sound of wellies squelching in river mud. And, as October fights to find the space to be wild in the whirling chaos of the world beyond the woods, it is also a feast for the soul.
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9781526601933 |
| Publication date: |
30th September 2021 |
| Author: |
Katya Balen |
| Illustrator: |
Angela Harding |
| Publisher: |
Bloomsbury Childrens Books an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing PLC |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Pagination: |
290 pages |
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Press Reviews
Katya Balen Press Reviews
Praise for The Space We're In;
A brave and beautiful book with a big heart. I loved it - Jenny Downham
What Balen captures in Frank's voice is the authentic experience of being ten and facing up to all the difficulties that brings. His story, and that of his family, will live long in the hearts and minds of its readers - A.F. Harrold
This book has everything: space and wilderness and crisps and code, Max in a wolf suit and a dog called Neil, and life and death and art, and above all a boy called Frank who will break your heart and mend it again and fill you with fizzing hope - Joanna Nadin
The struggles of those with autism and those who love them in a book with an achingly huggable main character - Kirkus Reviews
One of my favourite books this year. Beautiful and uplifting, a powerful evocation of nature and wildness that I found both surprising and incredibly moving. Tears were shed! -- Jo Boyles - The Rocketship Bookshop
Author
About Katya Balen
Katya Balen is an award-winning author of books for children. Katya's debut novel, The Space We’re In, was published in 2019 and was highly commended for the Branford Boase Award. Her second, October, October, won the Yoto Carnegie Medal. Her third novel, The Light in Everything, was published in 2022.
When she’s not writing books, Katya likes to scroll through dog-rescue websites, bake, and attempt to keep all her house plants alive. She lives in London with her partner and their dogs Raffi and Mouse.
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