Moonrise

I received a free copy of this from Netgalley through the kindness of the publisher.

I have always admired Sarah Crossan's books. Her book -One- was kept as a bestseller and on our Buy One Get One Free and Three For Two since it first came out, being highly recommended. I always wanted to read one

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of them, but other obligations always came up. When I saw it as a potential Netgalley Early Reviewer, I immediately put my name forward as I saw it as a sign. So I went into this blind, and I think that this might have made my experience slightly harder than it should be.

This mostly stems from my own reading preferences in how books are written. I went into this completely blind, for some reason completely forgetting that I had dipped into -One- every now and then it had been written more in free-flowing proses where sentences can be divided between two paragraphs, and conversations between people can exist within one paragraph rather than given their own life. This caused me to find it slightly difficult to read, as my inner editor was forcing me out of the story with nearly every sentence I was feeling disconcerted with how it was written. This isn't the fault of the author. Once I managed to hit my head a few times that this was how it was written, and that there was a point to this, I fell deep into the story and didn't re-emerge until several hours later.

This story griped my heart and then just squeezed, becoming tighter and tighter as it progressed. From the first moment the Main Character (Joe) leaves home to travel to where his brother (Ed) is imprisoned, it's as if his voice leaps up in the page. The broken up sentences between paragraphs immerse the reader into this thoughts, as if you watch him carry out the motions and can hear his unique voice running through his head. He easily pulls in the emotions of the other characters around him, especially in the case of Ed, Angela (Sister) and Aunt Karen, to keep the entire story flowing at a fast-paced rate that doesn't let the reader go.

And as it feels as though it's tumbling into the abyss, as all becomes loss after loss, the reader can't help but feel the same slight hope that Joe feels. The possibility of it actually occurring is slim, because of the reality of the book mirroring the reality we live in, but at the same time the reader clings on to the same hope as Joe.

I would highly recommend this book, for anyone twelve up. It punches the reader in the chest, again and again, and drives home what is mentioned in the news, and in various publications around crime. I now have no excuse to not read her other book -One-, as I want to be able to hand this book, and her other books, to customers in the shop.

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