This is one of the best books I've read in a long time, certainly this year. It tells of a teenage boy who, when his parents are killed in a car crash, is uprooted from the south-west of England to live with his maternal grandmother in the Lake District. In many ways, the story is about the challenges of being a teenager, of dealing with personal upheaval, and it captures perfectly and very sympathetically the intensity of being that age, and how extraordinary and dramatic life often feels. In doing so, this novel also succeeds in walking that very fine line between reality and magical realism and draws part of its tension from that uncertainty. What really made the book stand out for me, however, was the rare quality of writing. Lambert is a poet and award-winning short story writer and this shows: every word earns its place in the novel, driving the narrative forward, and never standing in the way or drawing attention to itself. Lambert doesn't tell the reader things but, instead, reveals them in the telling of the story and the writing is never obtrusive. This is definitely not a book just for the "Young Adults" in your life.