This is a profound and moving story of the extraordinary friendship between a 12 year old boy and his fox and their epic journey to be reunited as war rampages throughout the country. It begins with an act of betrayal as the boy’s father forces him to abandon the fox and compellingly describes the two friends’ struggle to find each other whilst caught up in an increasingly dystopian nightmare.

When Moose Flanagan and his family move home, yet again, and become residents of the famous prison island Alcatraz, things get interesting. First of all, they share the island with a few other families and a lot of pretty heavy-duty criminals including Al Capone. And secondly, Moose’s sister is starting a new school, which everyone hopes will help her become more integrated with those around her. This novel sensitively and humorously explores family dynamics, apparent public fascination with ‘bad guys’ and the lengths a boy will go to protect his autistic sister.

Year 9 will be exploring a collection of novel extracts and short stories selected to challenge, entertain and inspire. The intention is to develop vital critical reading skills and engage students with real world values such as ‘identity’, ‘freedom’, ‘tolerance, rights & respect’, ‘justice’, ‘diversity & community’, ‘democracy’, ‘equality & responsibility’, ‘change & action’, ‘power & control’.

We hope the novel extracts inspire year 9 to want to read the rest of them so all the featured titles have been purchased for our LRC. Equally, hopefully the experience of ‘Pax’ and ‘Al Capone Does My Shirts’ will leave year 7 students wanting more- they will be able to find other novels by Sara Pennypacker and Gennifer Choldenko on our shelves. All are ready and waiting for students to begin their imagination journeys.

Happy reading everyone!