Summer's Shadow

Summer’s life comes crashing around her when her mother is killed in a car accident.  With no father in her life she hopes that she will be able to stay with her best friend and family.  Then her mother’s will says that she is to go and live with totally unknown relatives in Cornwall; somewhere she has never been.  Her ‘cousin’ Tristan is welcoming yet distant, whilst his son is just rude, angry at her presence, and his wife seems to have disappeared from the large and rambling house.  Then Summer starts hearing strange noises and on several occasions thinks that she has seen her mother.  When you add a local boy called Zach into the mix as well as a mystery about her mother then we have the makings of a great story.

Anna Wilson is well known for her novels for younger readers, especially those with animal characters, so this is a real departure for her, one that she has carried off with great aplomb. She obviously has a great love of Cornwall and conveys this in her writing, bringing a real sense of place to the book.  There is also a feeling of tension and even foreboding about what Summer is going to discover about her past and the denouement brings an exciting and satisfactory conclusion to the work.   A lovely book that reflects the anguish that Summer is coping with, whilst reminding adults that keeping secrets is not always the best way forward.