Remix

Ruby and Kaz are 16-year-old girls who have just finished their GCSE exams. They are fervent fans of a band named Goldentone, and dedicated admirers of the band’s lead singer, Adam Wexler. The band is to perform at a festival called Remix. Ruby and Kaz are granted permission to attend, only because Ruby’s elder brother Lee promises to accompany the girls. Along with them is Owen, Lee’s boyfriend, in whose van they will all travel.

Kaz is excited because at the festival she hopes to run into her ex-boyfriend Tom Selkirk, for whom she is still hankering. Ruby also has an ex, Stuart Garside, who is also (to Ruby’s displeasure) likely to put in an appearance at Remix.

Two questions now pose themselves: which teenager will end up with whom, and whether fame is always a blessing or sometimes a curse?

Up to a point Pratt’s book is a very typical – one might almost say stereotypical – novel of teenage entanglement. The world of children’s literature probably has enough of such works. However the issue raised alongside the main theme, whether celebrity breeds indifference to human values, narrowly saves the book from an otherwise inevitable fate.