- Title: Callum and the Mountain
- Author: Alan McClure
- Publisher: Beaten Track Publishing
- Publication Date: 14th August 2019
Copy received from author for review purposes.
Description:
It’s a quiet wee village, Skerrils.
Not much going on. Shingle beach, pretty walks, peaceful library, exploding school, talking dogs, carnivorous monuments, interfering all-powerful nature spirits and a mountainous secret too baffling to tell…
Callum Maxwell and his pals are in for the strangest, scariest, most exciting summer of their lives.
Join them and you’ll never look at the natural world in quite the same way again.
My Thoughts:
This is the kind of book I wish had been around when I was growing up! I would have loved to read about Callum and his friends going on their adventures, and I will be sure to keep this copy handy for my daughter once she’s old enough to read it.
With the strange goings on around him, it’s no wonder that Callum starts to wonder what’s happening, he cannot quite believe the events that unfold in the opening pages, but it sets the scene perfectly for the capers that are to follow.
McClure has a wonderful way of creating the scene and bringing it to life with crisp descriptions, the magic that is woven throughout the narrative is thrilling and frightening in equal measure, making this such an exciting read!
The interactions between the characters feel natural and by using Scots in the language, the author adds an air of authenticity to it all without alienating non Scots speakers.
It’s a really fun read, with plenty of moments have you chuckling out loud as you read, especially the moment with one character speaking out of his bum! And that alone will make it appeal to many readers, but the story telling is what really makes this such a fantastic book to share with younger readers, but equally older readers will enjoy the adventure unfolding around them.
