Watching

Watching is actually six short stories previously published as the ‘Animals at Risk’ series which this Whitbread Award winning author has now rewritten as one novel. In this new version, the central character, a Chinese teenager called Lee, chooses five students from hundreds of applicants, to help him film a documentary to be entitled ‘Alien Invaders’, about animals that had been brought to the UK from abroad. The young enthusiasts struggle to work together sharing only their passion for the natural world until, one by one, they tell their own incredible stories about where their love of wildlife first came from. These are the stories that bring them together.

Lee’s story, for instance, takes us to China, where some villagers believe eating tiger meat makes the person as brave as the animal being eaten. Hannah’s story, set in East Africa, tells of ivory hunters, whilst Anya’s is a Hawaiian whale story. Woven into these six tales, the most dramatic tale of all unfolds, as the six youngsters wait and watch for a mysterious animal which turns out to be a wolverine. Pacy, atmospheric. Great climax.