No-Flinch Lynch

With his politician father serving a two-month prison sentence and his mother travelling the world campaigning for her environmental causes, 12-year-old Lorcan Lynch is forced to leave his native Dublin to go to stay with a marvellously eccentric aunt in the west of Ireland. Initially, he has to contend with some scornful bullying at his new school, a problem compounded by recurring attacks of asthma. Soon, however, he is befriended by fellow-pupil Blaise, who enlists him in her mission to rescue animals being maltreated on a nearby island. As the story of a boy engaged in several fights for freedom - helped here by inspirational memories of his family's historical links with Che Guevara - this is an enjoyable read; it is given considerable freshness by the picture of the contemporary Ireland, urban and rural, which serves as its background.