Chameleon Dad

Connie Fuller is a twelve-year-old Irish girl. She lives with her adoptive Mum, Mags, who is an airport cleaner. When she was four, her father, Ben, abandoned her in the café at Dublin Airport along with her chameleon named Hue.

Connie finds a letter written to her by her dad which Mags has kept secret. She decides to answer the letter and try to track him down without Mags knowing and without her consent. Can she and her friend, Thyo, find her dad and what secrets is he keeping?

There are three main themes of this novel: Thomas’s deep love of chameleons and Connie and Hue’s friendship. Second, is the concept of family in all its diversity. And third, is deception and its implications for relationships.

Thomas’s work is clever in that it deals in a very accessible way with some difficult and emotional themes. The reader might think that Chameleon Dad is a lighthearted novel. There is some humour but the book deserves to be taken seriously.